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BOWAPARTE 




EARLY LIFE, AND FIllST CAMPAIGNS, 



-'''*!?SR»?^fi?n.5;" 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE; 



WITH A 



HISTORY OF THE BONAPARTE FAMILY, 



A REVIEW OF FRENCH POLITICS, 



TO THE YEAR 1796. 



BEN: PERLEY POORE, 

Correspondins Member of the New York and the Rhode Island Historical Societies. 



/ 



BOSTON: 

TICKNOR, REED, AND FIELDS. 

1851. 



Entered according to an Act of Congress, in tiie year 1851, by 

Ben: Perley Poore, 

in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



PREFACE. 



Numerous as are the biographies of Napoleon Bonaparte, the reading public may 
not look ungraciously upon a young American's attempt to chronicle, from original materials, 
the early deeds of that extraordinary being, whose good and bad qualities have so intensely 
fixed the attention of the world. While all-adoring Frenchmen have sought to enhance the 
brilliancy of their idol's career, by the false glare of enthusiastic flattery ; British historians 
have been stimulated by a fantastic zeal for hereditary royalty, to blacken the reputation 
of the once powerful enemy of their nation : — and it is only by submitting these contra- 
dictory views to the test of a trans-atlantic balance, that they can be reduced to the standard 
of truth. This idea originated with Major Henry Lee, of Virginia, who was at Paris when 
Sir Walter Scott published his notoriously unjust "Life of Napoleon." Considering the 
name of the "author of Waverley" less glorious than that of the citizen Emperor — his memory 
less sacred than truth, the talented American determined to repair the injustice by an 
impartial history. The first volume was published at Paris, in January, 1837, and a few 
days afterwards the labors of the gifted author were prematurely suspended by his untimely 
decease. 

Marshal Soult, Gen, Pelet, and other veterans of the Imperial Army, had taken a great 
interest in Maj. Lee's work, and when (in 1846,) the subscriber commenced his re- 
searches in the Archives of the War Department at Paris, (as Historical Agent of the 
Commonwealth of Massachusetts,) he was induced to carry out the idea of his gifted 
countryman. Every facility was afforded hiin by the French Government, and in 
addition to the copies of important manuscripts from their Archives, he obtained 
the curious journals of several notable Americans who were in France during Napoleon's 
career. The Emperor's early homes, his palaces, and over forty of his sixty victorious 
battle-fields were carefully visited, — the French, English and American newspapers of the 
epoch were read, and many curious unpublished incidents were gathered from the lips of 
the survivors. From these valuable materials the subscriber sought to recapitulate the prin- 
cipal events of Napoleon's life, with their causes and their consequences. Not merelv 
his conquests and his creation of king-vassals — but the more glorious phases of his civil 
rule — his diplomatic intercourse, (particularly with the United States,) and his gigantic 
public works — his social and his domestic life — his loves and his hatreds — his glory and 
his exile — his virtues and his religion ! 

The greater portion of the following pages were printed last Winter, when the -subscriber 
was forced to suspend his labors — to glean historical materials in another field. Should this 
narration of the most uninteresting portion of Napoleon's life prove acceptable to the public, 
he will continue and complete it hereafter. The proofs of this volume, it is but justice to 
state, have been revised by that able historian, Mr. C. C. Hazewell, to whom the subscriber 
is greatly indebted for much valuable information. 

Many statements in this work will conflict with those advanced by other historians, par- 
ticularly. Sir Walter Scott. The " mithor of Waverhj " was unfitted for the task, for he 
had been to long engaged in converting history into fiction, to succeed in recording contem- 
poraneous events in the simple language of history. He had indulged too long in the realms 
of imagination to confine himself strictly to the rigid boundaries of truth; nor is it, therefore, 
surprising that discrepancies and mis-statements, omissions and mistakes, are to be found 
profusely scattered through his pages. The correction of these errors — to use the words of 
Maj. Lee — will counteract, in imposing form, and by a single operation, a diversified mass 
of historical falsehood, and establish in the reader's mind, various and important truths. 
It was observed by Lord Bacon, that " the enquiry of truth, which is the wooing of it ; the 
knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it ; and the belief of truth, which is the enjoy- 
ing of it ; is the sovereign good of human nature." 

Ben: Perley Poore. 
Indian Hill Farm, } 

JFest Newbury, 1851. 5 



" The stormy joy, the trembling hope 
That wait on mightiest enterprise; 
The panting heart of one, whose scope 
Was empire, and who gained the prize, 
And grasps a crown, of which it seemed 
Scarce less than madness, to have dreamed, - 
All these were his ; glory that shone 
The brighter for its perils past. 
The rout, the victory, the throne. 
The gloom of banishment at last, — 
Twice in the very dust abased, — 
And twice on Fortune's altar raised. 

" His name was heard and mute with fear. 

Contending centuries stood by, 

Submissive, from his mouth to hear 

The sentence of their destiny; 

While he bad silence be, and sate 

Between them, arbiter of fate. 
He passed, and on a barren rock 
Inactive closed his proud career, 
A mark for envy's rpdest shock. 
For pity's warmest, purest tear. 
For iiatred's unextinguished fire. 
And love that lives when all expire." 

— Translated from Manzord. 



THE BONAPARTE FAMILY. 



CARLO BONAPARTE, Advocate,— born at Ajaccio, March 29, 1746— died at Mont- 
pellier, Sept. 23, 1785. He married Letitia Ramolini, born August 24, 1750 — died 
at Rome in 1836 — mortal remains removed to Ajaccio in 1851. 

THEIR CHILDREN t 

I. JOSEPH, born at Corte, January 7, 1768— King of Naples from March 30, 1806, 
to 1808 — King of Spain from June 6, 1808, to 1813 — Exile in America, under the title of 
Count de Survilliers, sixteen years, during which time he resided at Bordentown, New Jer- 
sey — died in Italy, April 7, 1845. He was declared successor to the throne of France in 
the event of the death of the Emperor and his son without heirs. He married Marie Julie 
Clary, sister of one of the first merchants in Marseilles. She was also the sister of the wife 
of Bernadotte, who was made King of Sweden in 1818; and whose son, Oscar BernadottCj 
is the present King of Sweden. This Oscar in 1823 married Josephine, eldest daughter 
of Eugene, who was the son of the Empress Josephine. 

1. Zenaide Charlotte Julie, born 1804 — married June 30, 1822, to Charles, Prince 
Musignano, son of Lucien, Prince of Canino. 

2. Charlotte, born 1802 — married Napoleon Louis, son of Louis, King of Holland, 
in whose favor Louis abdicated in 1810 — he was the eldest brother of the present Pres- 
ident of France — he took part in the Italian revolution in 1831, in which year he diedj 
and she died in 1839. 

//. NAPOLEON, born at Ajaccio, August 15, 1769 — Emperor of the French, March 
18, 1804— King of Italy, March 26, 1805 — died in captivity at Saint Helena, May 6, 1821 
— mortal remains removed to France in 1841. He married: 1. Marie Rose Josephine 
Tascher de la Pagerie, born at Martinique, June 23, 1763 — married first to the Mar- 
quis de Beauharnais, and, secondly to Napoleon, March 9, 1796 — died at Malmaison, May 29, 
1814. 2. Marie Louise, Arch Duchess of Austria — born December 12, 1791 — created 
Grand Duchess of Parma, May 30, 1814^ — died, the mother of a large family, December 7, 
1847. 

1- Napoleon Francois Charles Joseph, bom at Paris, March 20, isii.and 

proclaimed King of Rome — after the abdication of his father, he was conveyed to Aus- 
tria, and named Prince of Parma, but was deprived of the right of succession to that 
Duchy by the peace of Paris, in 1814 — in 1818 he was created Duke of Reichstadt, in 
Bohemia. He died near Vienna, July 22, 1832. 

///. LUCIEN, born at Ajaccio in 1775 — President of the Council of Five Hundred at 
its dissolution by Napoleon — Minister of the Interior under the Consular Covernment — Am- 
bassador to Spain at the negociation for the creation of the kingdom of Etruria — retired 
from public life on his brother's assumption of the diadem — resided some time in England, 
where he arrived Dec. 18, 1810 — On Napoleon's abdication in 1814, he went to Rome, 
was well received by the Pope, and purchased considerable estates, from whence he derived 
the titles of Prince of Canino, Duke of Musignano, &c. — he joined his brother on his return 
from Elba, was arrested after the battle Waterloo, but allowed to retire to the Roman States, 
where he died June 25, 1840. He married: 1. Christine Boyer. 2. Alexandrine Laurence 
de Bleschamp. 

1. Lolotte, born 1796 — married to Prince Galincia. 

2. Christine Egypta, born 1798 — married to Lord Dudley Coutts Stuart, twelfth 
son of Lord Bate. 

3. Charles Lucien, born May 24, 1803 — a zealous naturalist — married hia cousin 
Zenaide. 

4. Lcetitia, born 1804 — married Thomas Wyse, an Irish Catholic Member of Parli* 
ament, who left her on account of her infidelity. 

5. Louis Lucien, born 1813. 

6. Pierre J^apokoni born 1815 — elected to the Natiolial Assembly in 1818. 

7. Antoine, bom 1816. 

8. Alexandria Marie, bora 1818 — married to Count ValOntini. 

9. Constance, born 1823 — a nun at Rome* 

10. Paul, died in Greece. 

11. Jeanne, married to the Marquis Honoratio. 



vni THE BONAPARTE FAMILY. 

IV. MARIE ANNE ELISA, born January 3, 1771— Princess of Lucca— died at 
Trieste, August 9, 1820. She married, March 5, 1797, Prince Felix de Bacciochi, who 
died August, 1820. 

1. J\rapoleone Elisa, born 1803 — married to Count Camerata. 

2. Frederic, born 1810 — died at Rome. 

V. LOUIS, born September 2, 1778— High Constable of France, 1804— King of Hol- 
land from May, 1806 to July 1810. He married Hortense, daughter of Josephine and 
the Marquis de Beauharnais, from whom he was afterwards separated — she died Oct. 5, 
1837; and he in Italy, July 25, 1846. 

1. JVapoleon Charles, born 1802 — heir to Napoleon on failure of his own issue — died 
1807. 

2. J\''apoleon Louis, born 1804 — married his cousin Charlotte — died 1831, supposed to 
have been poisoned. 

3. Louis Nauoleon, bom at Paris, April 20, 1808 — took part in the Italian 
revolution of 1831 — invaded France at Strasbourg in 1836 — visited the United States 
in 1837 — invaded France at Boulogne in 1840, and was imprisoned for life — escaped 
in 1845 — elected Representative in 1848, and chosen President the same year, by 
5,974,020 votes. 

VI. MARIE PAULINE, born October 20, 1780— created Princes of Guastalla, 1806 
— married: 1. General Le Clerc — 2. Prince Camille Borghese^ — died at Florence, June 9, 
1825. 

VIL MARIE ANNUNCIADE CAROLINE, born at Ajaccio, March 25, 1782— 
married Joachim Murat, King of Naples, July 15, 1808 — died at Florence, May 18, 1839. 
He was shot in Calabria, Oct. 15, 1815. 

1. JVapoleon AchiJle Charles Louis, born January 21, 1801 — Prince Royal of the 
two Sicilies — emigrated to Florida, where he died, April 15, 1847. 

2. Lcetitia Josephe, born April 25, 1802 — married Count Pepoli, of Bologna. 

3. Lucien Charles Joseph Francis JVapoleon, born March 16, 1803 — emigrated to 
South America, and thence to New Jersey — returned to France in 1848, and was elected 
a member of the National Assembly. 

4. Louise Julie Caroline, born March 22, 1805 — married to Count Rasponi, of 
Ravenna. 

VIIJ JEROME, born at Ajaccio, December 15, 1784 — King of Wirtpmberg — created 
Prince de Monlford, 1816 — named by his nephew Louis Napoleon, Governor of the Hopital 
des Invalides, at Paris, 1850. [Married in 1803, while in command of a French fleet at 
Baltimore, Miss Betsey Patterson, a native of Belfast, Ireland, then residing in that city. 
He carried her to France, but Napoleon had a divorce decreed, and sent her back to Balti- 
more. She had a son, Jerome, who has visited Europe, and been kindly received by his 
father — his son Jerome was recently a cadet at West Point.] Married, 2, Frederique 
Catherine Dorothee, Princess Royal of Wirtemberg — born February 21, 1783 — died No- 
vember 28, 1835. 

1. Jerome JVapoleon, born at Trieste, August 24, 1814 — Colonel in the army of 
Wirtemberg — died in 1847. 

2. jyi'ithilde Lmtitia Wilhelmine, born at Trieste, May 27, 1820 — married Prince 
Demidoff in 1841 — separated in 1848 — at the head of the Presidential mansion of her 
cousin in 1850. 

3. JVapoleon Joseph Charles Paul, born at Trieste, Sept. 9, 1822 — elected to the 
National Assembly in 1848. 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 

HIS LIFE AND TIMES. 



Napoleon Bonaparte was a native 
of Corsica, a mountainous island in the Tus- 
can sea, about one hundred and fifty miles in 
length, and fifty in breadth. Large forests of 
oak, pine and chestnut trees cover its high- 
lands, while in the fertile valleys are mul- 
berry, fig, citron, and orange groves. Herds 
of black sheep find sufficient pasture through- 
out the year, and an abundance of wine, 
grain, oil and fruits reward the labors of the 
husbandman. Industrious, temperate and 
frugal, the Corsican yeomen are strangers to 
poverty, devoted to their families, and as un- 
tameable in spirit as the stormy sea-winds 
that sweep their mountain-tops. Tracta- 
ble under the control of reason and religion, 
we find thai when these restraints do not 
exist, as in Corsica, a love of Independence 
degenerates into an egotistical resistance to 
all authority, while family pride leads to 
excesses which would be ridiculous, if they 
were not unfortunately unnatural and atro- 
cious. 

The Vendetta, as this barbarous social 
code is termed, obliges all the male relations 
of a murdered man, to the third degree of 
consanguinity, to avenge his death. Bur- 
glary, counterfeiting, poisoning, fraudulent 
bankruptcy — in fact, few if any of the crimes 
which spring from a refinement of civilization 
— are almost unknown in Corsica, but the 
victims to a savage thirst of family vengeance 
are numerous. Merciless and relentless, the 
self-appointed executioners of the Vendetta 
do not even give their doomed enemies a 
chance to fight for life. Amid the mountains 
are large plains of table-land, covered with 
the luxurious growth of the arbutus, the myr- 
tle, and the gum cistus. Here the executioner 
of hereditary vengeance will lie concealed for 
hours, and even days, until the doomed vic- 
tim passes unconsciously along one of the few 
tracks which are formed through the bushes, 
more by cattle and horses than by the labor 
of man. A bullet sends the unfortunate 
wretch to his last account " unhouseled, un- 



annealed," and a rough wooden cross man^ 
the spot where he fell. Sometimes, different 
sections of the same village are at war with 
each other, pitched battles ensue, families 
remain for weeks barricaded in their houses, 
and, worse than all, children cannot be sent 
to school, as there would be no mercy for 
them. In fact, they inherit this love of 
vengeance and blood, often attacking one 
another with loaded pistols. Even women 
lose the characteristic softness of their sex in 
this fiery atmosphere of hatred and wrath, 
and are to be seen loading and firing by the 
side of their fiithers and husbands, in the 
thickest of the fight.* 

Many of the principal Corsicans at the close 
of the last century, were bandits, a word of 
Italian origin, which signifies a banished per- 
son, and implies no degradation. Exiled 
from their Tuscan and Roman homes on 
account of their political opinions, they car- 
ried with them to the colony of Republican 
Genoa a high standard of mental capacity, 
and a love of Freedom. There was also a 
colony of the descendants of those ancient 
Spartans, whose actions all nations have ad- 
mired, but no one has ever successfully imi- 
tated. Driven from Lacedfemonia, after its 
rulers had ceased to observe the wise institu- 
tions of Lycurgus, the exiled Greeks preferred 
Corsica to any other location, because its 
mountainous surface presented them with the 
image of their native land.f In the course 
of time these immigrant races intermarried 
with the native Corsicans, thus mingling 
prominent traits of their national character in 
the blood of their offspring. Napoleon Bona- 
parte inherited an Italian love of independ- 
ence from his father — a Spartan sobriety and 
military spirit which had characterised the 
ancestry of his mother — and a native Corsican 
jealousy of family reputation which ever 
urged him to ennoble his name, and to ele- 



* Traits of Corsican Character. — Burdett. 
t Description of Corsica. — Prince Frederic. 



10 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 



vate the people who delighted to call him 
"Sire." 

Men who rise to eminence by their own 
exertions, seldom allude to those of their an- 
cestors who may have been distinguished, 
and when the Ernperorof Austria once alluded 
to the noble parentage of his Imperial son-in- 
law. Napoleon, remarked that he was the Ro- 
dolph of his family — a prince of that name 
having established the rule of the House of 
Hapsburg at Vienna. Yet genealogists — who 
turn from the actions of great men to their 
pedigrees, as travellers leave_ the currents of 
noble rivers to explore their sources — tell us 
that the name of the Bonaparte family is 
linked with Italy's past greatness. The ear- 
liest mention of them occurs in Bonifazio's 
History of Treviso, at the year 1178, when 
Giovanni Bonaparte was sent as envoy of the 
Trevisans to Padua, to leai^n the political sen- 
timents of that city. This Giovanni was one 
of the first knights of the Spanish order of 
St. Jago, instituted in 1170, and founder of 
the hospital of that order in his native city. 
His descendant, Nordillo Bonaparte, as Syn- 
dic of Treviso, concluded in 1271 a treaty of 
commerce between that city and Venice, and 
died in 1290, leaving his fortune to a hospital 
which still bears his name. Pietro Bona- 
parte, a brother of Nordillo, took a prominent 
part in a league of noblemen, formed in 1312, 
to oppose certain monarchial oppressions, and 
in 1319 he visited the court of Frederic of 
Austria, as Ambassador from Padua. 

About 1450, the Bonaparte family estab- 
lished themselves at San Miniato del Tedes- 
00, a picturesque village near Florence, where 
the remains of its feudal castle still exist. 
Here, in the archives of the house, was pre- 
served, "A History of the sacking of Rome 
by the Constable de Bourbon, in 1527," by 
Jacobo Bonaparte, who vv'itnessed, and boldly 
denounced the vandal-like conduct of the 
French — repeated, by order of the historian's 
descendant, in 1849. This work, which is 
now in the Royal Library at Paris, is a clever 
composition, but does not display either the 
brilliant style which is seen in "La Verdova," 
an early comedy from the pen of Niccolo 
Bonaparte ; or the profound thought which 
characterises the essays of Ranieri Bonaparte, 
who was the founder of the far-famed class 
of jurisprudence at the University of Pisa. 

Ardent partisans of the Ghibellines, the 
Bonapartes were mostly exiled from Tuscany 
by the victorious Guelphs, though one — a 
student, who cared more for astrology than for 
civil war — was permitted to retain the estate 
at San Miniato. One of his younger broth- 
ers, Ludovico Maria Fortuna Bonaparte, 
went to Genoa, from whence he emigrated to 
the " island of refuge" in 1612, and settled 
at Talavo, where he became the head of a 
"pieve,'^ or clan. All the Italian branches 
gradually became extinct, and when the re- 
nowned Corsican scion visited the home of his 
fathers, at the head of a victorious army, his 
only living kinsman was the Abbe Filippo Bo- 
naparte, canon of San Miniato. This was an 
old man, well-informed on the family history, 
and well to do in the world, though not rich 



enough, as he complained to his victorious 
kinsman, to procure the canonization of a 
certain father Bonaventura Bonaparte, who 
had died in a Capucin monastery at Bo- 
logna, in all the odor of sanctity. "The 
Pope will not refuse you," said the good 
Abbe, " if you ask him ; and should it be 
necessary to pay the sum now, it will be a 
mere trifle for you." 

Saints were not the order of the day at that 
stormy period, so Napoleon contented himself 
with creating his namesake a Knight of the 
Order of St. Stephen, though the old man 
was much less anxious about the favors of 
this world than the religious justice which he 
so pertinaciously claimed. Pope Pius VII., 
when he came to Paris to crown the Empe- 
ror, also referred to the claims of Father 
Bonaventura. "It was doubtless he," said 
the Pontif}', "who, from his seat among the 
blessed, had led his relative by the hand, as 
it were, through the glorious earthly career 
he had traversed, and who had preserved 
Napoleon in the midst of so many dangers 
and battles." The Emperor, however, al- 
ways turned a deaf ear to these remarks, 
leaving it to the Pope's own discretion to pro- 
vide for the glory of Bonaventura. As for 
the old Abbe of San Miniato, he died during 
the Empire, bequeathing his fortune to Na- 
poleon, who presented it to one of the public 
establishments in Tuscany.* 

Carlo Marie de Bonaparte, who was born 
in Corsica in 1747, was less fortunate and 
shorter lived than many of his ancestors, yet 
it is said of him that he was the Sire of 
Sovereigns, and among them of a Monarch, 
to whom Emperors were suppliants, and who 
prostrated, pardoned and created Kings, 
His grandfather left three sons — Joseph, 
Napoleon, and Lucien — he was the only 
child of Joseph ; Napoleon left only a daugh- 
ter, Elizabeth, (who married the head of the 
Ornano fiiiuily,) and Lucien was a priest. 
The young man who was thus the eldest in 
descent, as well as the sole representative of 
his name on the island, was educated by a 
priest among his picve, at Talavo, and 
afterwards sent to the mother country in 
order to complete his education. Commenc- 
ing his studies at the Roman Jesuits' college, 
he had a difficulty (which was never arrang- 
ed) with the fraternity, and went to Pisa. 
He was there warmly received as a descend- 
ant of one of the founders of the University, 
and took the degree of Doctor of Laws. 

Returning to Corsica, Carlo Bonaparte 
commenced the practice of law. Proud and 
high tempered, he became involved in fre- 
quent disputes, especially as he was openly 
hostile to the Jesuits, but his integrity or his 
honor were never questioned. The members ^ N 
of his profession respected his learning and t i 
admired his genius, while his genial humor ^ I 
excited enthusiastic affection among his inti- J I 
mate friends. Though not above the middle ■ i 
height, he had a symmetrical, imposing figure, i ,H 
and a handsome face ; his complexion was of j 
a clear olive tint, his eyes were piercing, and 



* Memorial of St. Helena. — Las Caaas. 



ANCESTRY AND FAMILY. 



il 



there was an expression of delicate sentiment 
about his finely formed mouth. Fastidious 
in his dress, he wore the* powdered wig and 
embroidered velvet of those times, with the 
sword that his rank entitled him to carry, and 
lie was noted for bland and courteous man- 
ners, with a spice of gallantry for the fair sex. 

When but nineteen years of age, he won 
the atiectious of Letitia Ramolino, and they 
ivere married in the cathedral at Ajaccio, 
lespite the disapproval by the families of this 
premature connexion. A descendant from 
ihat glorious people who banished Archilogus 
Prom Sparta for saying in jest " that it would 
be wiser to run away than to fall sword in 
liand," the young bride was a woman of rare 
palilies. Her graceful figure, passionate 
iark eyes, and bewitchingly beautiful fea- 
tures, were imprinted on the hearts of all 
who saw her ; and we are told that at an as- 
lemblage of the loveliest women in Corsica, 
it the Governor's palace, in order to soften 
;he hearts of some Sloslem ambassadors from 
Funis, iMadame de Bonaparte was pronounc- 
sd the most beautiful. Sir \\'alter Scott gives 
publicity to a pretended rumor of her crnni- 
lal intimacy with the octogenarian French 
jovernor, Count de Marboeuf, but there exists 
10 reason for calling in question her honorable 
conduct, dignity and intelligence, throughout 
ler chequered life. 

Though she became a widow at the age of 
;hirty, Letitia de Bonaparte was the mother 
•f tiiirteen children : Joseph, King of Spain. — 
\apoleon — Lucien, Prince of Canino — 
Louis, King of Holland, (the father of Louis 
Vapoleon) — Jerome, King of Westphalia — 
Eliza, Grand Duchess of Tuscany — Pauline, 
Princess Borghese — Caroline, Queen of Na- 
ples — and five who died in infancy. 

Carlo de Bonaparte's country Jiomestead 
ivas so burthened with mortgages, that he 
ivas unable to reside there in the feudal state 
,vhich became the head of a pievc, and moved 
nto a house owned by his bride, in Ajaccio, 
he principal city on the island. This build- 
ng, to which many a gallant man has made 
jilgrimage as the birthplace of the object of 
lis veneration, fornis one side of a court 
,vhich leads out of Charles street. It is of 
(tone, four stories in height, and fitted up 
with elegance and comfort. " You have per- 
laps visited it," said Napoleon to gaoler 
iludson Lowe, when speaking of his confined 
)rison shed at Longwood, " You have per- 
laps visited it — at any rate you resided long 
inough in Corsica to know that it was by no 
Beans the worst house on the island, and that 
[ have no reason to be ashamed of my family 
;ircumstances." * 

Opposition to despotism characterized Carlo 
le Bonaparte's early married life. In 1755 
he Corsicans had proclaimed the independ- 
ince of their island, and opposed, sword in 
land, the forces of their Genoese masters, 
'asquale Paoli, a young patriot who had not 
een thirty summers, was chosen their leader, 
ind although he could not drive the Genoese 
rom the island, he forced them to cede to 



• Manuscript note. — Montholon. 



France that which they could not retain. 
This transfer was by no means acceptable to 
the Corsicans, and no one was more indignant 
at the annexation than Carlo de Bonaparte, 
who made a speech in the Assembly which 
electrified the democracy of the island, while 
it also taught them the necessity of modera- 
tion. "If it only depended on the will to 
become free," said he, "all nations would 
be so ; yet history teaches us that very few 
have attained liie blessings of liberty, because 
few have had energy, courage, and virtue 
enough to deserve them." 

Madame de Bonaparte was also enthusias- 
tic for the restoration of her country's free- 
dom. Putting Joseph, her first-born son, to 
nurse, she joined her husband at die head of 
his picve, and shared with him the dangers 
and privations of a mountain warfare with the 
French invaders. Encouraging the timid, 
nursing the wounded, and inspiring all with 
invigorating examples of devotion to the cause 
of independence, she remained with the Cor- 
sican army until it was dispersed at the dis- 
astrous battle of Ponte Novo. Paoli fled to 
Leghorn, and Carlo de Bonaparte only delay- 
ed his own departure to obtain a safe-conduct 
for his wife, whose situation required the 
comforts of her home. It is for physiologists 
to determine whether the character of her 
expected oft'spring was influenced by this 
campaign, ennobled by the idea that it was 
carried on for the protection of hearths and 
homes. 

The fifteenth of August, 1769, was the 
Festival of the Assumption, and Madame de 
Bonaparte, who was a devout Catholic, at- 
tended the celebration of mass at the cathedral 
of Ajaccio. Warned homeward ere the cere- 
mony was concluded, she encountered on the 
way a military acquaintance, who, observing 
an uncommon glow in her countenance and 
lustre in her eyes, and never thinking that 
they were the effects of pain and agitation, 
complimented her on her unusual beauty. Ex- 
cusing herself, she hastened home, and with 
diriiculty managed to reach her parlor, and 
ring the bell. W'hen the domestic arrived, 
the irolher was found on the sofa, in a faint- 
ing fit, and the child was born — though not, 
as Scott chronicles, on " an ancient piece of 
tapestry, representing the heroes of the Iliad." 
He came into the world as he rose to great- 
ness, without assistance.* 

Carlo de Bonaparte was at Porto Vecchio 
when he received the intelligence of this 
accession to his family, and had engaged his 
passage to England, but his uncle Lucien, the 
archdeacon, persuaded him to remain. In 
conformity with the custom in his family, the 
second son was christened Napoleon. 

Every summer, the young Napoleon visited 
Talavo, where he was idolized by the shep- 
herds who tended his father's flocks, and soon 
listened with interest to their tales of vendettas 
and civil strife. When at Ajaccio, his favo- 
rite retreat was a grotto, formed by an arch- 
ing rock and overlooking the sea, at the villa 



* Statement of Madame de Bonaparte to Mf^or 
Lee, in 1830. 



12 



NAPOLEON 



of his maternal half-uncle, a priest who after- 
wards became Cardinal Fesch. Often during 
his captivity at St. Helena did he allude to 
these happy years of his childhood, declaring 
that "the very smell of the earth would 
enable him to distinguish his native land, even 
were he conducted blindfold to her shores." 
A small brass cannon was his constant play- 
thing, and Scott submits to the enquiry of 
philosophers, whether the future love of war 
was suggested by the accidental possession 
of such a toy ; or whether the tendency of 
the mind dictated the suggestion of it ; or, 
lastly, whether the nature of the pastime, 
corresponding with the taste which chose it, 
may not have had each their action and re- 
action, and contributed between them to the 
formation of a character so warlike. 

Little is known of Napoleon's earlier years, 
and he has informed us that they were marked 
by stubbornness and curiosity. His charac- 
ter, remarkable for its impetuosity, had in it 
something of a petulant restlessness, and it 
was his delight to hector and tease his elder 
brother Joseph, though his mother used to 
keep him in tolerable subjection. He after- 
wards said of her, that she never overlooked 
a good or bad action of her children, and 
expressed his belief that he owed his eleva- 
tion to her tuition. She said of him that, 
though wild and headstrong, he was a kind 
brother and a good son. In conversation 
with Major Lee, (in 1830,) she mentioned 
the extreme fondness and partiality of Napo- 
leon's father, who often saved his favorite 
from her correction, and controlled him fre- 
quently by threatening to tell her of his diso- 
bedience, saying: "Very well, sir, I shall 
tell your mother, and she will teach you to 
behave better." "This threat," Madame 
de Bonaparte added, " usually checked Na- 
poleon ; but sometimes I had to switch him 
well." 

When six years of age, he was sent to a 
girl's school, kept at Ajaccio by Madame 
Muselii, and was noted for his slovenly attire, 
as well as for the preference he displayed for 
a pretty little girl who was his class-mate. 
Some of the other school-girls, jealous and 
fond of tormenting the youthful admirer, used 
to shout after him in their native Italian — 

"Ifapo/eone di mezza calzetta. 
Fa Vamore a Giaeominetta.'" 



BONAPARTE 

-♦ 



Which is translated : — 

"Nap, with his stockings dangling at his heels. 
To Giacominetta's love appeals." 

This was the signal for impetuous attack. 
With characteristic bravery the insulted lover 
would pelt his tormentors with stones until 
they were glad to retreat, and leave him to 
enjoy the society of his sweetheart. 

When he was somewhat older, his mother 
forbade the children climbing the fig-trees in 
the garden, but Napoleon, when the fruit be- 
came ripe, could not resist the temptation, 
and was one day sitting on a branch, filling 
his pockets, when up came the gardener. 
Napoleon knew that this man had orders to 
tie any of the children thus detected, and 
carry them to the house, but he made so elo- 



quent an appeal that the gardener's heart was 
touched, and he did not deliver up the culprit 
to the dreaded switch. The next day, how- 
ever, Madame de Bonaparte missed her fruit, 
and the gardener, in order to clear himself, 
exposed Napoleon, who was duly chastised. 
How difficult to conceive the twice-crowned 
conqueror, whose frown darkened the face of 
Europe, trembling in a fig-tree at the threat 
of a peasant. 

Napoleon and Joseph were instructed inl 
Latin and Greek by their uncle, the archdea- 
con Lucien, who was a man of great learning 
and wisdom, venerated by his parishioners, 
whose disputes he used to settle amicably. 
Careful and econoniical, he had saved the 
patrimony, and reestablished the fortune ol 
Carlo de Bonaparte, which had been materi- 
ally deranged by the war of Independence, 
and the unsuccessful issue of an enterprist 
for draining and cultivating salt marshes. Ht 
also persuaded Carlo to take the oath of alle- 
giance to the French, and then procured hini 
the appointment of assessor to the Roya; 
Court of Ajaccio, a situation which made hL 
income sufficient for the respectable mainte* 
nance of his family. 

The worthy archdeacon observed, witli 
equal curiosity and satisfaction, the rare intel' 
lect, independence of character, and higlj 
spirit of Napoleon, though they did not alwayn 
agree in opinion. One dispute arose from ; 
wish expressed by Napoleon that goats migb! 
be restrained from going at large, an idei 
which his uncle disapproved of, for he pos 
sessed large herds, and defended them like 
patriarch against the threats of his imperioui 
pupil. His last words, spoken to the famil 
gathered around his death-bed, were like 
prediction of the future greatness of his favc 
rite nephew. Enumerating his bequests, h 
said ; " As for Napoleon, it is useless to giv 
his fortunes a thouo'ht, for he will create them j 
Joseph is the eldest, but Napoleon is thehea ' 
of the family." 

When ten years of age. Napoleon an ,, 
Joseph accompanied their father to Franci (, 
where he was sent as a Deputy to the Kin ,1 
from the Assembly of Corsica. The joy wii 
which Napoleon had prepared for the journe 
however, was damped by his sorrow when 
was necessarv to bid his mother adieu ! 
historian states that their sorrow was mutua 
— he hung upon her neck with true filial afl'e 
tion, and shed floods of tears as he craved h 
blessing — while she clung to her child vvi 
the fondness of maternal love, wept over L 
tender years, and was only reconciled to Y 
departure by the prospects of his advanc 
ment. The scene made such an impressi( 
on Napoleon's naturally ardent mind that, 
the end of his life, he tvas wont to say ', 
should never forget the bitterness of that fii 
separation from a parent to whom he was 
devotedly attached, and of whom he was 
deservedly fond. 

Passing through Florence, Carlo de Bon 
parte found that his name and the rank of 1 
family were not forgotten, and the Gra 
Duke Leopold gave him a letter to Marie A 
toinette, his sister. Arriving at Paris, t 



THE SCHOOL OF BRIENNE 



13 



unfortunate queen, then in the height of her 
beauty and her power, welcomed the Corsi- 
can deputy to her brilliant festivals at Ver- 
sailles, and through her influence, when 
Joseph was placed in a classical seminary at 
Autmi, Napoleon entered the royal military 
school at Brienne as a King's scholar. 

The monks who had the superintendence 
of the school at Brienne soon became attached 
to their young Corsican pupil, and he quickly 
made himself conspicuous by his progress and 
application. This excited the jealousy of his 
comrades, who used to insult him, and make 
his Italian accent the subject of their mirth. 
At first he used to resent these taunts by 
blows, but his sensitive mind soon sought 
relief in solitude. In 1814, during the bloody 
campaign, he pointed out a tree near Brienne 
under which he used to sit for hours when a 
boy, reading "Jerusalem Delivered," and 
pondering over his wrongs and mortifications. 

Ere many months had elapsed, the perse- 
cuted Corsican was not only respected by his 
school-fellows, but exerted such an influence 
over them that he was chosen director and 
regulator of their amusements. In the sum- 
mer he would have fortresses reared of turf, 
and in winter of snow ; then, dividing the 
school into attacking and defensive parties, 
he would lead the assailants, while he direct- 
ed the resistance made against them. Even 
then he studied the capabilities of those around 
him, and this Lilliputian warfare was but a 
prelude to his gigantic victories. 

Dramatic entertainments were given at the 
quarterly examinations of the school, and on 
oneoccasion, when the "Death of Caesar" was 
to be represented. Napoleon was officer of the 
guard at the door. Orders had been given to 
admit no one without a ticket, but a woman 
named Haute, who was portress at the school 
gates and a retailer of cakes and milk to the 
boys, hoped to gain admission through the 
favor of some of the young guards. Finding 
every sentinel determined to do his duty, she 
began to express her indignation in a loud 
voice, and the sergeant of the guard reported 
the fact to Napoleon. Though only thirteen 
years of age, he did not hesitate between the 
inclination of the boy and the duties of the 
officer, but, with that firmness of character 
for which he was always remarkable, went 
to the door and exclaimed: "Remove in- 
stantly that woman, who is bringing here the 
license of a camp." The tone of his voice 
and gesture imposed a calm at once on the 
spectators, and the disappointed woman 
walked away. When the stern boy became 
Emperor of the French, he established her 
and her husband in the porter's lodge at his 
palace. 

Napoleon was of an extreme sensibility, 
and when a brutal assistant-teacher sen- 
tenced him one day to wear a penitential 
dress, and dine on his knees at the door of 
the refectory, his proud spirit so revolted at 
the humiliation that he fell into convulsions. 
The principal of the school happened to pass 
at the time, and Father Patrault, the profes- 
sor of Mathematics, obtained a pardon for his 
favorite pupil, observing that " in treating 



Napoleon with such undeserved severity, 
they did not understand what they were 
dealing with." In after years. Napoleon 
appointed Father Patrault financial agent at 
Alilan, and the ex-professor soon accumulated 
a large fortune, with which he returned to 
Paris. One day he obtained an interview 
with his old pupil, and asked another office, 
stating that misfortunes had reduced him to 
beggary. Telling him to return the next day, 
Napoleon ordered an investigation, which 
proved that Patrault had lent his capital at 
exorbitant rates of interest, and then lost it by 
the bankruptcy of his creditors. Usury never 
found favor in Napoleon's eyes, so when the 
applicant appeared for a reply to his request, 
(he answer was : " I was indebted to you, 
but I paid my debt by your Milan appoint- 
ment — nor can I make a man's fortune 
twice." 

The usher of the mathematical class at 
Brienne was Pichegru, a charity scholar. 
France was thus rearing in the same class the 
patriot who was the terror of the Bourbons, 
and the traitor who endeavored to restore 
their cruel rule. He formed a correct opin- 
ion of young Bonaparte, however, and when 
asked m 1796 whether it would be possible 
tor the Royalists to gain the victorious gene- 
ral, he replied : " To attempt that would be 
a waste of time^ — from my knowledge of him 
when a boy at school I am sure he must be a 
most inflexible character — let him once em- 
brace an idea, and he will never relinquish 
it."* 

Though distinguished in the studies directly 
embraced in the profession of arms — mathe- 
matics, history and geography — the Principal 
had not a very high opinion of Napoleon's 
abilities. Bourrienne, who was his class- 
mate, says that he had no taste for the study 
of the languages, polite literature, or the fine 
arts, but used to pass many of the play-hours 
in reading Plutarch and Ossian. Dining with 
the Duke of Orleans during a visit made by 
that profligate politician to the chateau near 
the school, a lady who was conversing with 
him on the subject of his studies, alluded to 
Turrenne. " He was certainly a great man," 
said she, " but I would have liked him better 
had he not burned the Palatinate." "And 
why not, madame," eagerly demanded the 
future victor, " if it was necessary to the suc- 
cess of his designs?" This anecdote — in 
the spirit of which may be discovered the 
embryo of that gigantic decision which was 
exemplified in his raising the siege of Mantua 
— shows how soon his understanding was 
capable of combining the extended reasoning 
of military policy, with the technical conclu- 
sions of the art of war.t 

Buoyant with aspirations of a future career 
which would enable him to win honor and 
glory. Napoleon gradually lost faith in the 
Roman Catholic doctrines which his pious 
uncle Lucien had instilled into his infant mind. 
There was not, however, any diminution in 
his family affections, nor did he ever write a 



* The Royalists in Exile. — Larochejacquehn. 
t Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 



14 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 



more characteristic letter than one to his 
mother, dated at Brienne. After repeated 
thanks for her devoted attention to his early 
education, and for her solicitude respecting 
his future advancement, he said — " With my 
sword by my side, and my Homer in my 
pocket, I hope to find my way through the 
world." 

Brienne was one of twelve military schools, 
from which the best pupils were annually 
selected, for the Military College at Paris. 
The examiner in 1784 was the Chevalier de 
Keralio, an amiable old soldier, who used to 
play with the boys during their hours of recre- 
ation, and conceived a strong partiality for 
^' Lapaille au nez," (straw in his nose,) a 
nickname given to young Bonaparte from the 
Corsican accent with which he pronounced 
his name, as if written " Na-poil-lo-ne." 
He even singled him out as one of the num- 
ber to be promoted from Brienne to Paris, 
although he was under the requisite age. As 
the lad was not very far advanced in any 
branch of education except those previously 
mentioned, the monks proposed detaining him 
a year longer, that he might acquire more 
knowledge of the French and Latin languages 
— above all, he was not fifteen. But this the 
Chevalier de Keralio would by no means 
agree to : "I know what I am about," said 
he, " and if I transgress the rule, it is not on 
account of any family influence, for I am not 
acquainted with any friends of this youth — it 
is solely on account of his superior merit. I 
discover in him a spark of genius which can- 
not be too carefully cherished." 

In the Chevalier's report to the King, of the 
pupils which he had selected for promotion, 
we find the following entry: " Monsieur de 
Buonaparte, (Napoleon,) born the 15th of 
August, 1769. Height, four feet, ten inches, 
ten lines.* Has finished his fourth degree. 
Of good constitution, excellent health, a char- 
acter docile, frank and grateful, and strictly 
regular in conduct. Has always distinguished 
himself by his application to mathematics — is 
tolerably conversant with history and geogra- 
phy, but rather deficient in polite accomplish- 
ments, as well as Latin. Would make a 
good seaman." 

The friends of Washington, when in his 
fifteenth year, were so confident that he 
"would make a good seaman," that they 
obtained for him a warrant of midshipman in 
the British navy. At the persuasion of his 
mother, he subdued his inclination to mari- 
time adventure, but still displayed, on shore, 
his predilection for arms. How difl^erent, 
from what it now is, niight have been the 
condition of Christendom, had Washington 
and Napoleon, or either one of them, been 
induced by their friends to enter upon a naval 
career. 

In October, 1784, young Bonaparte, with 
four other students, left Brienne for Paris, 
where he saw his father for the last time. 
Attacked with cancer of the stomach. Carlo 
de Bonaparte sought the medical advice of 
the metropolis, and his pride was flattered by 



X Five feet, six and a lialf inches of our measure. 



the compliments paid to his favorite son, who 
he had not seen since he entered at Brienne. 
A few months afterwards, the hand of death 
arrested the happy father at Montpelier, on 
his way to Corsica. Joseph, his first borni 
son, smoothed his dying pillow, but in mo-- 
ments of delirium he used to call for Napoleon, 
and invoke the succor of his mighty sword — 
as if the clouds which darkened the mind ofi 
the parent, were tinged with the prospects of 
the greatness and glory that were to descend 
upon his son.* During Napoleon's Imperial 
reign, the city authorities at Montpelier asked 
leave from him to erect a magnificent monu- 
ment over the humble grave of Carlo de 
Bonaparte. "No," was his sensible reply, 
" Had I lost my father but yesterday, it 
would be natural to pay his memory some 
mark of respect consistent with my present 
situation. But many years have passed since 
the event, and it is one in which the public 
can take no concern. Let us leave the dead 
in peace." 

The Military College at Paris was estab- 
lished by Louis XV. as a nursery for suchi 
scions of nobility as were to be trained for 
officers in the French army — able to fight 
hard and to drink hard, to live hard and to 
die hard. Sumptuous diet, luxurious furni- 
ture, gay uniforms and fine saddle-horses 
were liberally furnished each cadet, — an en- 
ervating luxuriousness which Napoleon sooni 
saw would be incompatible with the vicissi- 
tudes of a soldier's life. Though not sixteen 
years of age, he drew up a memorial showing: 
that the system of education was pernicious,^: 
and making suggestions which were worthy 
of his Spartan descent. 

In this memorial, vvliich is curious as the 
first essay of Napoleon's ministrative genius,- 
he submitted to the officers of the college 
" that the plan of education was pernicious,- 
and could never accomplish the end desiredi 
by every wise government — that the royal 
pensioners, being all the sons of gentlemen ci 
decayed fortune, instead of having their mind? 
improved, could derive nothing therefrom, 
save a love of ostentation, together with sen- 
timents of conceit and vanity, so that, on 
rejoining the domestic circle, far from relish- 
ing the frugal gentility of their parents, the) 
will feel inclined to despise their modes' 
homes, and even to blush for the authors o 
their being — that, therefore, in lieu of retain- 
ing a numerous crowd of domestics aboiil 
these young men, setting before them meah 
of two courses daily, making a parade with ; 
very expensive establishment of horses aii( 
grooms, would it not be better to oblige then 
to do everything for themselves, with tlit 
exception of a little cooking — to place befor* 
them ammunition bread and soldier's rations 
and accustom them to camp life, by makin< 
them brush their own clothes, clean their owi 
shoes, and mend their own stockings .' That 
since they are far fiom being rich, and are 
destined for the military service, the duty o 
that service is the only education which the) 
should receive — that, thus habituated to a lifi 



*■ Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 



THE PARIS MILITARY COLLEGE, 



15 



of sobriety, to maintain with steadiness the 
life of a soldier, they would at the same time 
grow more robust, would be able to brave the 
inclemencies of the seasons, to support with 
courage the fatigues of war, and inspire the 
men under their command with respect and 
profound devoted attachment." 

These ideas, which evince a surprising ma- 
turity of judgment, did not find much favor 
when considered by the officers to whom they 
were addressed — men, whose maxim was: 
on duty, discipline, and oil" duty, dissipation — 
but in after years Napoleon carried his pri- 
mary conception of a military education into 
successful operation. 

An assiduous student. Napoleon's superi- 
ority was more marked at the College of Paris 
than it had been at Brienne. The celebrated 
Monge, who was his instructor in geometry, 
formed a high opinion of his talents. ]\Ion- 
sieur L'Eguille, the professor of history, de- 
clared that he would beconje a great man, 
and to his name in the class-book atlixed this 
note, (alluding probably to his vivacity of 
genius and passionate application, which gave 
an oriental warmth to his elocution) — "A 
Corsican by birth and character — he will dis- 
tinguish himself if favored by circumstan- 
ces." 

Years afterwards. Napoleon used often to 
invite his teacher to breakfast at the palace, 
and talk over the old lessons. " That which 
made the deepest impression on me," he said 
one day to 3Ionsieur L'Eguille, "was the 
revolt of the Constable of Bourbon, though 
you did not present it to us precisely in its 
proper light. You made it appear that his 
great crime was his having fought against his 
king, which certainly was but a triHing fiult 
in those days of divided nobility and sove- 
reignty — particularly considering the scanda- 
lous injustice of which he was the victim. 
His great, his real, his only crime, and that 
on which you did not sufficiently dwell, was 
his having come wath foreigners to attack 
his native soil." It is to be regretted that 
Bernadoite, jMoreau, and Pichegru could not 
have been inspired with this genuine patriot- 
ism. 

Monsieur Domairon, the professor of belles 
lettres, used to speak of Bonaparte's compo- 
sitions as " blocks of granite issuing red hot 
from a volcano," and the splendor of the 
young Corsican's genius was only doubted by 
Herr Bauer, the professor of German, who 
could not induce him to master the Teutonic 
tongue. One day it so happened that Bona- 
parte was not in his place, and the professor 
was informed that he was attending his 
examination in the artillery class. "Oh! 
ho !" said the linguist with a sneer, " then he 
does learn something.'" " Why, Monsieur 
Bauer," exclaimed a student, " he is the best 
mathematician in the school." "Well," 
responded the opinionated professor, " it may 
be so. I have ever heard it remarked, and 
have ever believed the remark to be true, 
that none but a fool could learn mathematics." 
"It would be curious," said Napoleon at 
St. Helena, to Las Cases, "to know whether 
Bauer lived long enough to ascertain my real 



character, and to enjoy the confirmation of his 
own judgment." 

The reputation of the young Corsican 
reached beyond the college yard, for it was 
rare, in those days, to see a studious cadet. 
A large majority of Napoleon's comrades 
were continually indulging in wild freaks or 
gallant intrigues, but he ))assed even the hours 
set apart for relaxation in studying Vauban, 
or Muller, with a firm determination to merit 
an officer's epaulette — the height of his am- 
bition. Once only was he provoked into an 
altercation, by a cadet named Bussy, who 
persisted in practising on the French horn in 
a room adjoining his dormitory. Napoleon 
ordered him to discontinue his music — Bussy 
challenged him — and it was with difficulty 
that their comrades prevented a duel. In 
1814, Napoleon, who was then Emperor, 
again met the horn-player, who was residing 
on his estate near Soissons, and who furnished 
some important information respecting the 
position of the enemy. Recognising his old 
opponent, the Emperor adverted with good- 
humored frankness to their former dispute, 
shook him heartily by the hand, and appointed 
him one of his aides-de-camp.* 

Invited into society, he was soon a welcome 
visitor at the most notable saloons of Paris ; 
from the magnificent receptions of Madame 
Necker, where diplomatists and academicians 
held solemn converse, to the cosy boudoir of 
Madame Helvetius, that favorite resort of 
Franklin during his residence at Auteuil. 
Though short, his appearance was preposses- 
sing, for his olive-tinted complexion was as 
intelligent in expression as his limbs were 
vigorous and well-proportioned. His flashing 
black eyes had a sagacious expression, indi- 
cating a vehemence of character, checkered 
and tempered by a cautious and observing 
spirit. Firmness and intrepidit}' were strongly 
marked about his mouth, and when at all 
excited, his broad nostrils appeared to breathe 
fierceness and disdain. His manners were so 
reserved as to forbid a sudden intimacy, and 
yet were characterised by a sincerity of expres- 
sion which could not but encourage confidence. 

The husband of Madame Helvetius was, 
until his death, a zealous Freemason, and it 
was at her house that Bonaparte became ac- 
quainted with the principles of that venerable 
institution which unites its members by a mys- 
tic tie. He was initiated, and became a mem- 
ber of the lodge of " Les JVevf Saurs," 
inscribing his name with that of many distin- 
guished brethren who were admitted or affili- 
ated into this poetical section of the craft — 
Benjamin Franklin and Paul Jones among the 
rest. Bonaparte was never a " bright Ma- 
son," but he always protected the fraternity, 
and when he became Emperor of the French, 
a lodge-room was fitted up in the palace of the 
Tuilleries. It was there, in April, 1805, that 
Joseph Bonaparte was initiated, that he might 
at his Imperial brother's request, act as Grand 
Master of the Grand Lodge of France. In 
this palace lodge, Cambaceres (the arch- 
chancellor,) sat in the East, while the sove- 



Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. — W. Hodson. 



16 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



reign of Europe was content to serve as 
Marshal. Those who part on the " square" 
meet on a " level." 

" A Preliminary View of the French Revo- 
lution," occupies nearly seven hundred pages 
of Sir Walter Scott's "Life of Napoleon," 
forming the two first volumes. A beautiful 
historic tissue, finely wrought with reverential 
loyalty, it impresses upon the reader that 
there were neither treasons nor sudden death, 
neither slavery nor tyranny, neither want nor 
woe, so long as the Capets ruled over France 
and Navarre. " A simple, virtuous, and re- 
ligious people," the Baronet of Abbottsford 
tells us, " would have rested content," and 
the French Revolution is accordingly described 
as a viilanous plot to wake the world out of 
that sweet sleep which it had enjoyed for 
three thousand yearp, by thrusting the torch 
of modern philosophy in its eyes. "The 
derangement of the finances," we are assured, 
was the proximate cause of the fearful strug- 
gle, and no mention is made of the blood- 
stained chronicles of that race which had its 
" legitimate" claims to treat thirty millions of 
men as its property, cut shorter by a head. 
Those who believe in "that retributive jus- 
tice which God implants in earthly actions," 
will find stronger cause for merciless ven- 
geance in the history of the Capet race. 

Hugh Capet, in the year 996, succeeded as 
mayor of the palace, in seizing on the crown 
of France. This usurper caused Lothaire 
and Louis V., the two last kings of the Carlo- 
vingian race, to be poisoned. The right 
claimed by the Bourbons to reign over France 
in perpetuity, seems therefore to be founded 
not in the " Grace of God," but in rebellion 
and regicide. 

Passing over several vindictive and cruel 
kings, we are horror struck at the excessive 
dissipation, and the inflexible atrocity of 
Philip the Fair, a prince without faith, who 
violated all the rights of the nation and of 
individuals. Posterity will always remember 
the massacre of six thousand Knights Tem- 
plars in one day, and the unjust division of 
all their property between the King, the 
Pope, and the Order of Malta. His son, 
Louis X., during his short reign, shewed him- 
self the inheritor of his father's avarice. 
Sacrificing every thing to this passion, he 
made a common traffic of justice, nor could 
anything excuse the cold barbarity with which 
he caused the ignominious death of Enguer- 
rand de Marigny. 

Philip the Long did not abandon the arbi- 
trary system of his predecessors — that is, he 
asserted his "right divine to govern wrong" 
to the letter, by prostituting the magistracy, 
and levying contributions by his own author- 
ity. Charles the Handsome imitated his 
father and his brothers in trampling on his 
people, and Philip VL combined all the vices 
of the most odious of his predecessors. We 
fi,nd in his disastrous reign the assassination of 
fourteen Breton and Norman gentlemen, who 
had come to Paris by the invitation of the 
king, on the public faith, and were, notwith- 
standing, beheaded without a show of justice. 

The execution of the Count d'Eu without 



judgment, that the court favorites might share 
his property, the detention of the King of 
Navarre, and the massacre of his faithful 
adherents, are stains upon the history of John 
n., who covered France with misery and 
shame. He caused to be choked one day, 
and decapitated the next night, Raoul de 
Nesle, High Constable of France, who was 
lately returned from the prisons of England — 
and it was to gratify his jealous revenge that 
the two brothers Harcourt, the Lord of Mau- 
buet, and Colinet Doublet had their heads 
chopped off without any form of trial. 

Charles V. passes for one of "the best of 
kings." He was so. He was also called 
the wise, because his father was a fool, and 
his son a madman. Take tne following as an 
example of pure "legitimacy ;" — The town 
of Montpelier complained respectfully that the 
officers of the king infringed on their rights and 
privileges — no redress was afforded to their 
grievances — a tumult arose, and twenty-four 
of the royal officers were killed. Well. 
Charles sent the Duke of Berri there with an 
army. At his approach, the inhabitants and 
magistrates presented themselves before him, 
with ropes round their necks, their clothes 
rent, with the keys of the city gates, followed 
by the priests and clergy with the cross, dis- 
solved in tears, and crying misericordia ! 
In the midst of this deplorable scene, the 
Duke passed through the gates which were 
left open, and found the rest of the people on 
their knees in the streets — men, women, chil- 
dren, the old and the young — all repeating the 
heart-rending cry, misericordia, misericor- 
dia ! — a detail which cannot be read in the 
history, without drawing tears of pity. But 
the Duke, being of a mild, paternal race, saw 
the actual scene without being in the least 
moved — he had a scaffold raised on the spot, 
and pronounced a sentence by which six hun- 
dred of the inhabitants, taken discretionally 
among the people, were condemned to death 
— two hundred to be hanged, two hundred to 
be burnt, two hundred to be beheaded — the I 
children of all to be declared infamous, and 
their goods confiscated. This Duke of Berri 
was a very "legitimate" personage, and the 
name remained in the time of Bonaparte and 
the First Revolution. 

The reign of Charles le Bien-Aime was sig- 
nalised during its forty years continuance by 
avarice, ambition and ferocity. During a 
war with Flanders he beheaded the governors 
of all the towns which he took, and he hanged 
up before the gates of his palace three hun- 
dred of the principal inhabitants of Paris, 
Rouen and Orleans, who had ventured to re- 
monstrate against certain taxes. 

Charles VH. had Alexander d'Orleans as- 
sassinated for speaking ill of hnn and his 
amours. He suff^ered Gilles de Retz, Mare- 
chal of France, accused of witchcraft, to be 
burnt alive ; and, from pure cowardice, he 
refused to save from the flames the heroic 
Joan of Arc, to whom he owed the preserva- 
tion of his crown. 

The name of Louis XL is synonymous 
with all that is treacherous, despotic and su- 
perstitious — a bad son, a bad father, a bar-] 



THE CAPET 



RACE 

♦ 



OF KINGS 



17 



barous brother, an ungrateful master, a dan- 
gerous friend, a perfidious enemy — he made 
the executioner Tristan his chief favorite and 
his constant companion. Among the thous- 
ands who were sent by him to the scaftbid for 
remonstrating against the increase of taxation, 
was Jacques d'Armagnac, Duiie of Nemours. 
This nobleman was devotedly attached to his 
children, and the barbarous king had them 
placed under the scaffold, clothed in white 
robes, on which the blood of their father fell. 
Led from this horrible scene, bathed in tears, 
and covered with the blood from which they 
received their own, the young princes were 
confined in dungeons, made in the form of 
panniers, pointed at bottom, so that they 
might have no rest. They were taken out 
twice a week in order to be scourged, and 
every three months had a tooth or two 
drawn.* 

Charles VIII. sacrificed his subjects to the 
pretensions which the House of Anjou had 
given him to the throne of Naples. In his 
reign commenced those terrible wars in Italy, 
which gave the most terrible blows to French 
liberty, and even to that of all Europe, by 
necessitating the expedients of finance, and 
the illegal and unbounded augmentation of the 
royal revenues. Doomed to wear "a fruit- 
less crown," and hold "a barren sceptre in 
his gripe, thence to be wrenched with an un- 
lineal hand, no son of his succeeding," he 
beggared France. 

Under the reign of Francis I. the French 
soil was deeply stained with Protestant blood. 
The executioners beheaded thousands of vic- 
tims, who were guilty of no other crime than 
having prayed to God in a language which 
they understood. The " Hero of the Field of 
the Cloth of Gold" was despotic and unmer- 
ciful — the patron of American colonization, 
the friend of literature, but the deadly foe of 
the Reformation. 

Henry II. came to the throne by the death 
of the Dauphin, who was poisoned by the 
Count de Montecoculo. He delivered over 
his subjects to farmers of the revenue, favo- 
rites and persecutors, and gave the signal of 
civil and religious wars. Sacrificing his honor, 
his interests, his nation and his glory to a 
ridiculous passion for the Duchesse de Valen- 
tinois, he permitted her to condemn Protes- 
tants to death, and then enjoy their confiscated 
estates. Killed in a tournament, he left the 
crown to his boy-son, whose short reign was 
stained by persecution, civil war, and blood- 
shed. Atrocious laws were published against 
the Protestants, whose sect had increased by 
the light of the funeral pile, and under the 
steel of the executioner — the firm resistance 
of the Chancellor De I'Hopital prevented the 
establishment of the Inquisition at Paris, but 
it was advocated by the king, his council, and 
the parliament. 

Charles IX. came to the crown in 1560, 
when only ten years of age, and executed in 
childhood what Caligula had only wished. 
After meditating with profound darkness the 
most abominable perfidy, he exterminated at 

* Memorial of the Princes to the States — 1483. 



one blow an hundred thousand Protestants, 
giving the fatal signal on the evening of St. 
Bartholomew. In the capital the streets re- 
sounded with the discharges of fire-arms, the 
cries of the dying, the supplications for mercy 
of the doomed, and the demoniacal shouts of 
the murderers. The dastardly monarch fired 
on the fugitives from his palace windows, and 
the massacre was repeated in all the towns 
of France. 

Henry III., an indolent prince, enslaved 
by worthless favorhes, and sunk in the most 
shameless libertinism, gave himself up to the 
perfidious counsels of his mother, Catherine 
de Medicis, who cannot be named without 
horror. 

France revived at last under a king who 
was only a private gentleman. Henry IV., 
formed in the school of adversity, was accus- 
tomed to appreciate men, because he had long 
need of them, and had proved all the vicissi- 
tudes of fortune. Yet his most prominent act 
was that odious code by which— as a sample of 
the edicts — " any peasant taken with a fowl- 
ing-piece, near a thicket where there is game, 
shall be driven with a whip all around the 
spot until he drops blood." We have an 
equal right to reproach this prince with his 
criminal passion, at the age of fifty-six, for 
the Princess de Conde — a passion which was 
the cause of a disastrous war with Spain. 

The reign of Louis XIII., called "the 
Just," was signalised by the destructive pro- 
ceedings of the sanguinary Richelieu, conjbin- 
ing the mischiefs of ministerial and fiscal 
oppression, and disgracing the nation by that 
insidious shuffling policy, which became, by 
way of excellence, the science of the court. 
The massacre of the Protestants at La Ro- 
chelle and at Montrevel, the abandonment of 
the queen-mother, (Mary de Medicis,) and 
the decapitation of such men as the Marshal 
de Marillac and Cinq Mars, inspire one with 
horror and contempt for " Louis the Just." 
Credulous and fanatic, his reign is nothing 
but a chaos of intrigues, baseness, perfidy and 
atrocities, in a court where steel and poison 
were not spared. 

Louis XIV., "the Grand," in the course 
of a very long reign, finished, by outrages of 
all kinds, the work of despotism. A proud 
Sultan, who never knew any other rule but 
his will, and united to the madness of arbi- 
trary power the fury of intolerance, he drove 
out of the kingdom a hundred thousand fami- 
lies, carrying with them the arts, the manu- 
factures, the riches of France, to distant na- 
tions. The north of Germany, a country yet 
without industry, held out her arms to these 
fugitives — a whole suburb in London was 
peopled with refugee silk-weavers from Lyons 
— Holland gained some excellent officers and 
soldiers — and many valuable citizens found a 
home in the new world. While the proscrip- 
tion was going on, Louis sought to enlarge his 
colonial possessions, and althougl he had 
" little opinion" of the value of the newly 
discovered Mississippi valley, he formed sev- 
eral expeditions for the capture of Boston, 
and the subjugation of "heretic New Eng- 



18 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



land" to Catholic Canada.* Having-spent 
during his reign near twenty thousand mil- 
lions, he left at his death four thousand five 
hundred millions of national debt. He was 
barbarous, dissolute, perfidious in his treaties, 
a pitiable egotist, an unfit administrator, who 
sacrificed the natural and incalculable riches 
of France to ruinous illusions. 

The reign of Louis XV., called " the Well 
Beloved," dishonored him and France for 
forty years in the eyes of the world. Aban- 
doned females often directed his weak-minded 
ministers, and English gold so corrupted min- 
isters and generals, that battle flags were 
lowered in defeat — for a consideration. His 
son died when a youth, leaving a child, whose 
subsequent bridal with the Austrian Marie 
Antoinette was marked by the sacrifice of 
1200 Parisians, who were crushed or tram- 
[)led to death during the festivities. In 1774 
he succeeded to the throne, (as the thirtieth 
successor to Hugh Capet,) and as h was 
greeted king, exclaimed prophetically — "O ! 
God ! what a misfortune to me." 

After this brief sketch of the " mild pater- 
nal sway" which was exercised by the " Le- 
gitimate" rulers of France, it is difficult to 
believe Sir Walter Scott's statement that 
" the devoted loyalty of the people to their 
king had been for several ages the most 
marked characteristic of the nation." Long 
before young Bonaparte entered upon his 
career, tides of blood had washed away " the 
species of devoted attachment with which 
France formerly regarded the ancient line of 
her kings." 

Bonaparte, unlike most of his feUow pu- 
pils, did not regard the Military College as 
a forge for those mental fetters which despot- 
ism seeks to rivet on the salient spirit of its 
subjects. True, he was a Royal pensioner, 
and a suppliant for Royal favor. Receiving 
his commission in August, 1785, he took the 
prescribed oath of allegiance, but never ac- 
knowledged " that power above the law, 
accountable only to heaven for its exercise, 
its use or its abuse" — Legitimacy. Uncon- 
taminated by power, his Corsican heart could 
not collect the sighs and moans 'of the 
wretches that she (Legitimacy,) had doomed 
to pine without a cause in dungeons, to prove 
that she was the dread sovereign of the human 
heart — or the groans and shrieks of victims 
stretched upon the rack, to prove that the 
minds of men belonged to her — or the cries of 
hunger, the rags, the emaciated wan looks, 
by which she proved that the bodies of men 
were hers. Neither could he forget the wide 
spreading desolation which she had breathed 
from her nostrils — the famine and pestilence 
which she had scattered before her for her 
wantonness — the desolate Protestant hearth- 
stones crushed under her feet — and the op- 
l)ressed peasantry, who reverentially bowed 
before the sacred doctrine of " millions made 
for one." 

These sentiments of hostility to the degene- 
rate Bourbons were not softened by his pre- 



* Massachusetts Archives. — French Documents. 



sentation at court on receiving his commission. 
Legitimacy (as there personified in Louis 
XVL and his brilliant court) passed her time 
in masque, and dance and dainty revel. The 
unbounded extravagance of the government 
had deranged the debt-laden finances, an in- 
solent hereditary nobility exercised odious 
privileges, while avaricious tax-collectors, and 
strict monopolies, were meanwhile alienating 
the affections of the people, whose aversion to 
Royalty was fanned by the returned volun- 
teers from America. 

The young lieutenant and his comrades 
used to discuss the doctrine of "divine right," 
and were divided into three parties : — The 
"Royalists^' were of opinion that a copious 
distribution of leaden balls with the stringent 
powers of steel, were quite sufficient to cure 
the complaints of the multitude, and to restore 
vigor to the all but worn out system. The 
Patriots felt desirous to keep the skeleton of 
government entire, and wished to remove 
some of the most diseased parts, that they 
might be replaced with matter of a more 
healthy complexion. A third party, the "Re- 
publicans," sought to overturn the Bourbon 
throne, toabolish hereditary nobility, to secure 
liberty of conscience, and to build up a free 
and independent government like that of the 
United States.* 

Bonaparte was certainly not a Royalist, 
and although he avowed himself a Patriot, 
his ideas were decidedly Republican. They 
are stated at length in an essay which he 
anonymously offered for a prize given by the 
Academy of Science at Lyons, and which 
was adjudged to him. "It is impossible," 
says Sir Walter Scott, " to avoid feeling curi- 
osity to know the character of the juvenile 
theories respecting government, advocated by. 
one who at length attained the power of prac- 
tically making what experiments he pleased.. 
Probably his early ideas did not exactly coin- 
cide with his more mature practice ; for 
when Talleyrand, many years afterwards,, 
got the Essay out of the records of the Acade- 
my, and returned it to the author, Bonaparte 
destroyed it after he had read a few pages, "t 

The above statement is as untrue as it is 
unjust. When a prisoner at St. Helena, Na- 
poleon gave Gen. Montholon a copy of this- 
essay — his original theory of government— .- 
with orders to have it published twenty-five 
years after his death. Its interest calls for its 
re-production here, as revised after the ratifi 
cation of the author's experience. | 

"Q,UESTION, by the Abbe Raynal, 
What are the principles and institutions, 
by application of which mankind can be 
raised to the highest pitch of happiness 7 

" ESSAY. Literary societies ought never 
to have been animated by any other feeling 
than the love of truth and honor ; but there is 
no truth without prejudice. There art no 
men where kings are despotic ; there is only 
the slave oppressor, still more vile than the 
slave oppressed. This explains why literary 



* Life of Napoleon. — Hodson. 

f Life of Napoleon. — Scott. 

\ Address before the Academy. — Robinson. 



POLITICAL 



societies, since the beginning of time, have 
offered the melancholy spectacle of flattery, 
and the most disgraceful adulation. 

"This explains why the really useful sci- 
ences, those of morals and of politics, have 
been suff'ered to languish in oblivion, or have 
been lost in the labyrinth of obscurity. They 
have, however, made rapid progress in latter 
times. This has been owing to some men of 
spirit, who, urged forwards by their genius, 
have feared neither the thunders of a despot 
nor the dungeons of a Bastile. These rays of 
light illumined the atmosphere, threw a new 
light upon public opinion, which, proud of its 
rights, destroyed the enchantments which had 
bound the world, as with a spell, for so many 
centuries. Thus was Rinaldo restored to 
virtue and to himself, as soon as a courageous 
and friendly hand held up to him the buckler, 
in which were traced at the same time his 
duty ind his apathy. 

" To what can we with more propriety 
compare the immortal works of these great 
men, than to the divine buckler of Tasso ? 
The liberty thus acquired after an energetic 
struggle of twenty months, and the most vio- 
lent exertions, will be forever a glory to 
France, to philosophy, and to literature. 
Under these circumstances, the Academy 
proposes to determine those truths and feel- 
ings which it is most necessary to inculcate 
upon man for his happiness. This question, 
really worthy of the consideration of the free 
man, is in itself an eulogy on the sages who 
proposed it. None is more likely to answer 
the purpose of the founder. 

"Illustrious Raynal ! If, in the course of 
a life harassed by prejudice and the great 
whom thou hast unmasked, thou hast ever 
been constant and immovable in thy zeal for 
suffering and oppressed humanity, deign this 
day, in the midst of the applause of an im- 
mense nation, — which, called by thee to lib- 
ert}', renders to thee its first homage, — deign 
to smile upon the efforts of a zealous disciple, 
whose feeble attempts thou hast been kind 
enough sometimes to encourage. The ques- 
tion which I am about to consider is worthy 
of thy pencil ; but, without aiming at possess- 
ing its power, I have exclaimed, ' /, too, am 
a painter /' 

"It is indispensably necessary, in the first 
place, to fix clearly our ideas of happiness. 

"Man is born to l)e happy. Nature, a 
beneficent mother, has endowed him with all 
the organs necessary to this first design of his 
creation. Happiness, then, is nothing more 
than that enjoyment of his life, which is most 
conformable to his organization. Men of all 
climates, of all sects, of all religions ! are 
there any among you, the prejudices of whose 
dogmas should prevent you from acknowledg- 
ing the truth of this principle ? Let such, if 
any there be, consider truly and honestly, — 
and then let them say whether they do not be- 
lieve with me in this. 

" We must live, then, in a manner con- 
formable to our organization, or we cannot be 
happy. 

"Our animal organization feels certain in- 
dispensable cravings, those of eating, drink- 



PRIZE 

■♦ 



ESSAY, 



ing, procreation ; nourishment, therefore, a 
lodging, a covering, a wife, are indispensably 
necessary to our happiness. 

"Our intellectual organization gives rise to 
demands no less imperious, and the satisfac- 
tion of which is much more precious. It is in 
their full development that happiness is really 
to be sought. Perception and the reasoning 
powers form the essence of man. Ihese are 
his titles to the supremacy, which he has ac- 
quired, which he retains, and will retaui for- 
ever. 

" Our feelings revolt against restraint, ren 
der dear to us the beautiful and the just, and 
disagreeable to us the oppressor and the 
wicked. Wo to him who does not acknowl- 
edge these truths ! He knows nothing of life 
but the shade ; he knows no pleasure but the 
enjoyment of sense. 

"Our reasoning powers lead ns to make 
comparisons. From reasoning arises perfec- 
tion as the fruit from the tree. Reason, the 
inexorable judge of our actions, ought also to 
be their invariable guide. The eyes of rea- 
son preserve man from the precipice of his 
passions, in the same way as its decrees 
modify ever the feelings of his rights. Feel- 
ing gives rise to society ; reason maintains it 
entire. 

"It is necessary for us therefore to eat, to 
drink, to procreate, to feel, and to reason, in 
order to live like men ; that is, in order to be 
happy. 

"Of all the legislators, whom the esteem of 
their fellow-citizens has raised up to give them 
laws, none appear to have been more con- 
vinced of these truths than Lycurgus and 
Paoli. It was by very different courses, how- 
ever, that they have put them in practice by 
their legislation. 

"The Lacedremonians enjoyed an abund- 
ance of food, they had convenient habitations 
and dress, their wives were robust, they 
reasoned in their social meetings, and their 
government was a free one. 1 hey enjoyed 
their strength, their glory, the esteem of their 
countrymen, the prosperity of their country. 
These were all means of gratifying their feel- 
ings. Their affections were excited — their 
families, their emotions, roused — by the vari- 
ous views and the beautiful climate of Greece; 
but it was principally at the sight of strength 
and virtue that they felt moved. Virtue con- 
sisted hi courage and strength. Energy is the 
life of the soul, as well as the mainspring of 
reason. 

" The actions of a Spartan were those of a 
strong man ; the strong man is good, the weak 
man wicked. The Spartan lived in a manner 
conformable to his organization ; he was 
happy. 

' ' But all this is but a dream. On the banks 
of the Eurotas, at the present day, resides a 
pasha of three tails ; and the traveller, griev- 
mg over this sight, retires affrighted, almost 
doubting for a moment the goodness of the 
Governor of the universe. 

"But to conduct men to happiness, must 
they, then, be equal in means '. To what 
point must the love of an equali > if faculties 
be inculcated upon tli-m? f^:. _ feelmg ig 



20 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



necessary to a happy life, what are the feel- 
ings with which they should be inspired ? 
What are the truths which ought to be ex- 
plained to them ? You say, without reason- 
ing no happiness can be complete. 

" FIRST 'PART. 

"Man, at his birth, brings with him into 
the world a right to that portion of the fruits 
of the earth necessary for his subsistence. 

"After the buoyancy of childhood comes 
the commencement of passion. He chooses, 
from among the companions of his sports, her 
who is to be the companion of his destiny. 
His vigorous arms, in connection with his 
wants, demand labor ; he casts a glance 
around him ; he sees the earth, divided 
among a few possessors, affording the means 
of luxury and superfluity. He asks himself, 
'By what right do these people possess this ? 
Why is the idler everything, the laborer noth- 
ing ? Why have they left me nothing of all 
this, — to me, who have a wife, an aged father 
and mother, to maintain ?' 

"He runs to the minister, the confidant of 
his secrets ; he explains to him his doubts. 
'Man,' answers the priest, 'never reflects 
upon the existence of society ; God conducts 
all ; abandon yourself to Providence ; this 
life is only a passage ; all things are disposed 
by a Justice, the decrees of which we should 
not seek to explain. Believe, obey, never 
areson, and work ; — these are your duties.' 

" A proud soul, a sensitive heart, a natural 
reason, cannot be satisfied with this answer. 
He wishes to communicate his doubts and his 
inquietude, and goes to the wisest man of the 
country, — a notary. ' Man of wisdom,' says 
he, ' they have divided the goods of the 
country, and have given me nothing.' The 
wise man laughs at his simplicity, takes iiim 
into his study, leads him from act to act, from 
contract to contract, from testament to testa- 
ment, and proves to him the legitimacy of the 
division of which he complams. 

" ' What [ are these the titles of these gen- 
tlemen?' he exclaims, indignantly; 'mine 
are more sacred, more incontestable, more 
universal ; they are renewed with my breath- 
ing, circulate with my blood, are written on 
my nerves and in my heart ; they are the 
necessity of my existence, and, above all, of 
my happiness.' And, with these words, he 
seizes these papers, and casts them into the 
fire. 

" He immediately begins to fear the pow- 
erful arm called justice ; lie flees to his hut, 
and throws himself in violent emotion on the 
calm body of his father. The venerable old 
man, blind and paralyzed with age, seems 
only still to live by the forgetfulness of the 
great tyrant. Death. 'My father,' he cries, 
' you gave me life, and with it a lively desire 
for happiness ; and now, my father, robbers 
have divided everything among themselves. 
I have but my arms left ; for these they 
could not take from me. I am condemned, 
then, to the most ceaseless labor, to the most 
degrading toil, for money. Neither under the 
sun of August, nor during the frosts of Janu- 
ary, will there be any repose for your son. 



And, as the reward of such great labor, others 
will gather the harvest produced by the sweat 
of my brow ! And if I could even supply all 
that is necessary, I must feed, clothe, and 
keep warm a whole family ! We shall be in 
want of bread, my heart will be torn at every 
moment, my sensibility will be blunted, my 
reason will be obscured. O, my father, I 
shall live stupid and miserable, and perhaps 
wicked ! I shall live unhappy. Was I born 
for this ? ' 

"'My son,' answers the venerable old 
man, ' the sacred characters of nature are 
traced in your bosom in all their energy ; pre- 
serve them carefully, in order to live happy 
and strong ; but listen attentively to what the. 
experience of eighty years has taught me. 
My son, 1 reared you in my arms, I witnessed 
your joung years ; and now, when your heart 
begins to palpitate, your nerves are doubtless 
accustomed to labor, but to moderate labor, 
which refreshes the body, excites the feelings, 
and calms the impatient imagination. My 
son, have you ever wanted for anything ? 
Your dress is coarse, your habitation rustic, 
your food simple ; but once more I ask, have 
you ever had a desire unsatisfied ? Your sen- 
timents are pure as your sensations, as your- 
self. You wished for a wife ; my son, you 
have chosen one. I aided with my experi- 
ence to direct your youthful heart. O, my 
tender friend, why do you complain? You 
fear for the future ; act always as you have 
hitherto done, and you need not fear it. 

" ' My son, if I had been among the num- 
ber of those miserable men who possess noth- 
ing, I should have trained your body to the 
animal yoke ; I should myself have stifled 
your feelings and your ideas ; I should have 
made you the first of the animals in your shed. 
Bent under the dominion of habit, you would 
have lived tranquil in your apathy, contented 
in your ignorance ; you would not have been 
happy, O my son, but you would have died 
without knowing that you had lived ; for, as 
you yourself say, in order to live, it is neces- 
sary to feel and to reason, and then not to be 
weighed down by physical wants. Yes, 
good young man, let this information console 
and refresh you ; calm your inquietude ; these 
fields, this hut, these cattle, are oi»»b. I have 
^purposely kept you in ignorance of this ; it is 
so happy and so sweet to rise, so hard to 
descend ! 

" 'Your father will soon be no more ; he 
has lived long enough, he has known true 
pleasures, and now feels the greatest of all, 
since he once more presses you to his bosom. 
Impress one thing on your heart, my son, if 
you v^'ish to imitate him : your soul is ardent, 
but your wife, this sweet gift of love, and 
your children, what objects are these, with 
which to fill the void in your heart ! Do not 
nourish a cupidity of riches. Riches only 
influence happiness in as far as they procure 
or refuse phys'ical necessaries. You have 
these necessaries, and with them a habit of 
labor. You are the richest man in the coun- 
try ; bridle, then, your disordered imagina- 
tion ; you require but to call reason to your aid. 

" 'Are the rich happy? They have it in 



POLITICAL PRIZE ESSAY. 



21 



their power to be so, but not more than you 
have ; they have it in their power, I say, for 
they are rarely happy. Happiness resides 
especially in your station of life, because it is 
that of reason and feeling. The station of the 
rich is the empire of a disordered imagination, 
of vanity, sensual enjoyments, caprice, and 
fantasy ; — never envy it. And even should 
all the riches of the country be offered you, 
cast them far from you ; except, indeed, 
you should receive them for the purpose of 
dividing them immediately among your fel- 
low-citizens. But, my son, this struggle of 
strength of mind and magnanimity is only 
fitting for a god. Be a man, but a true one ; 
live master of yourself. Without strength 
of mind there is neither virtue nor happiness.' 

" I have thus demonstrated the two ex- 
tremes of the social chain ; yes, gentlemen, 
let the rich man be made one, I consent to 
this ; but let not the miserable man be made 
the other ; let it be the small proprietor, or 
small merchant, or the skilful artisan, who 
may, by moderate labor, feed, clothe, and 
lodge his fiimily. You will recommend, then, 
to the legislator, not to establish the civil law 
under which a few men might possess every- 
thing. He must resolve his political problem 
in such a manner that even the least may 
have something. He will not by this means 
establish equality •, for the two extremes are 
so distant, and the latitude so great, that in- 
equality may exist in the intervening ranks. 
Man can be happy in the hut as well as in the 
palace, covered with skins as well as clothed 
with embroidery from Lyons, at the frugal 
table of Cincinnatus as well as at that of 
Vitellius ; but then he must have this hut, 
these skins, this frugal table. How can the 
legislator bring this about? How can he 
resolve his political problem in such a manner 
that even the lowest may have something ? 
The difficulties are great, and I know of no 
one who understands better how to overcome 
them than Monsieur Paoli. 

" M. Paoli, whose solicitude for the welfare 
of humanity and of his fellow-countrymen 
is his distinguishing characteristic, who for a 
moment revived in the middle of the Mediter- 
ranean the splendid days of Sparta and of 
Athens, — M. Paoli, full of those feelings and 
of that genius which Nature sometimes unites 
in one man Cor the consolation of nations, ap- 
peared in Corsica, and drew the eyes of 
Europe upon himself. His fellow-citizens, 
tossed hither and thither by wars at home and 
abroad, recognized his ascendant, and pro- 
claimed him nearly in the same manner as 
the citizens of Athens formerly did Solon, or 
those of Rome the triumvirate. 

"Affairs were in such disorder, that a 
magistrate, clothed with great authority, and 
possessing transcendent genius, alone could 
save his country. 

'* Happy the nation in which the social 
chain is not firmly enough riveted to cause 
fear of the consequences of such a rash step ! 
Happy wh^n it produces men who justify this 
unbounded confidence, who render themselves 
worthy of it ! 

" Placed at the helm of affairs, and sum- I 



moned by his countrymen to give them laws, 
M. Paoli established a constitution, founded 
not only on the same principles as the exist- 
ing one, but even on the same administrative 
divisions ; there were municipalities, districts, 
procurators, and a system of the procurators 
of the country. He overthrew the clergy, 
and appropriated the property of the bishops 
to the nation. In short, the course of his gov- 
ernment was almost that of actual revolution. 
He found, in his unequalled activity, in his 
warm and persuasive eloquence, and in his 
penetrating and supple genius, means of pro- 
tecting his new constitution from the attacks 
of the malicious and his enemies, for Corsica 
was then at war with Genoa. 

"But M. Paoli's principal merit in our eyes 
is, that he seemed convinced of the principle, 
established by civil law, that the legislator 
should assure to every man such a portion of 
property as would suffice, with moderate 
labor, for his support. For this purpose, he 
separated the territories of each village into 
two kinds ; those of the first order, plains fit 
for sowing or for pasturage ; and those of the 
second order, mountains fit for the cultivation 
of olive-trees, chestnut-trees, and trees of all 
kinds. The lands of the first order, called 
pasture-lands, became public property ; but 
the temporary use of them was enjoyed by in- 
dividuals. Every three years, the pasture- 
ground of each village was divided among the 
inhabitants. The lands of the second order, 
susceptible of peculiar cultivation, remained 
under the inspection of individual interest. 

" By this wise arrangement, every citizen 
was born a proprietor, without destroying in- 
dustry, or injuring the progress of agriculture; 
in short, without having helots. 

" But all legislators have not found them- 
selves in the same circumstances ; they have 
not all been able to manage affairs, and to 
conduct them to such a happy issue ; but j'et, 
pressed by the principle, they have rendered 
homage to it by excluding from society all 
those who possessed nothing, or did not pay 
a certain tax. Why this second injustice ? 
Because the man whom the laws have not 
enabled to be happy cannot be a citizen, — 
because the man who has no interest in the 
maintenance of the civil law is its enemy, — 
a portion of property ought to have been se- 
cured to him, in order to interest him and 
attach him to this law ; but, in default of 
this, it has been necessary to exclude him, as 
a degraded, dull creature, and, as such, in- 
capable of exercising a portion of the sove- 
reignty. These are doubtless the political 
reasons ; but what are they in the eyes of 
morality, of humanity ? When I see one of 
these unfortunate creatures transgress the law 
of the state, and sufi^er for it, I say to myself, 
' It is the strong making the weak their vic- 
tim.' I imagine I see the American perishing 
for having violated the law of the Spaniard. 

"After having persuaded the legislator that 
he should care equally for the fate of all ranks 
of citizens in the enaction of his civil law, 
you will say to the rich man, 'Your riches 
constitute your misfortune : remain within the 
limits of your senses ; you will then be no 



22 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



longer uneasy or fantastical. How saany the peaks of Mount Blanc ; watch the sun 
younor house-keepers run to ruin, because emerging by degrees, bringing consolation and 
they are in want of the very thing which 



makes you so uneasy I You have too much, 
and they have not enough. Your lot is the 
same, with this difference, — that you, being 
wiser, might remedy it, whilst they can only 
groan. . . . Man of ice, does your heart, 
then, never beat ? I pity you ; I abhor you ; 
you are unhappy, and the cause of unhappi- 
ness in others.' 



Without marriage, we have said, there : choly of Nature. 



warmth to the hut of the laborer. Let the 
first beam which he sheds dwell and be 
remembered in your heart. Bear in mind the 
pleasure you enjoy. 

" Descend to the coast of the sea ; observe 
the god of day sinking majestically into the 
bosom of infinity ; — melancholy will over- 
power you, — you will abandon yourself to ita 
impression : no man can resist the melan- 



is neither health nor happiness ; you will, 
therefore, teach the numerous class of advo- 
cates of celibacy, that their pleasures are not 



Stand under the monument of St. Remi, 
— contemplate its majesty ; the picture of 
these proud Romans, traced in past ages. 



true ones, except you find that, convinced ; transports you into the society of .iEmilius, 
that they cannot live without wives, they seek ! Scipio, and Fabius. You return to yourself 
in those of other men the gratification of their to gaze on the mountains at a distance, cov- 



appetites ; you will then publicly denounce 
them. You will teach them that the happy 
man alone is worthy of his Creator ; that tiie 



ered with a dark veil, crowning the immense 
plain of Tarascon, where a hundred thousand 
Cimbrians lie buried. The Rhone flows at 



Fakir who mutilates himself is a monster of its extremity more rapid than an arrow ; a 
depravity and folly. i road lies upon the left, a small town in the 

" You will laugh with indignant disdain, | distance, a flock in the meadows. You 
when they endeavor to persuade you that per- I dream, without doubt. It is the dream of 
fection consists in celibacy. You have opened sentiment. 



tthe great book of reason and feeling, and will 
pherefore disdain to answer the sophisms of 
prejudice and hypocrisy. 

"Let the civil law secure to every one 
physical necessaries ; let the inextinguishable 
thirst for riches be displaced by the consoling 
feeling of happiness. At your voice, let the 
old man be the father of his children ; let 
him divide the property equally among them; 
and let the pleasant sight of eight happy 
households cause the barbarous laws of pri- 
mogeniture to be forever abhorred. Let 
man, in short, learn that his true glory is to 
live as a man ; and at this voice let the ene- 
mies of Nature be silent, and bite their ser- 
pent tongues with rage. Let the minister of 
the most sublime of religions, who should 
bring peace and consolation to the wounded 
souls of the unfortunate, learn to know the 
sweet emotions of love ; let the nectar of 
pleasure make him sincerely sensible of the 
greatness of the Author of his being ; then, 
truly worthy of public confidence, he will be 
a man of Nature, and an interpreter of her 
decrees. Let him choose a companion ; that 
day will be the triumph of morality, and the 
true friends of Nature will celebrate it hearti- 
ly. The minister, awakened to a feeling of 
these new joys, will bless the age of reason 
as he tastes its first benefits. 

"These, gentlemen, are the truths, as far 
as regards animal necessities, which must be 
taught to men for their happiness. 

"second part. 

" What is sentiment ? It is the bond of 
life, of society, of love, of friendship. It is 
that which unites the son to the mother, the 
citizen to his country ; it is especially power- 
ful in the child of Nature ; dissipation and 
the pleasures of sense destroy its delicacy and 
refinement, but in misfortune man always 
finds it again ; it is that spirit of consolation 
which never abandons us but with our lives. 

"Are you not satisfied ? Climb to one of 



" Wander abroad into the country ; take 
shelter in the miserable cabin of a shepherd ; 
pass the night stretched upon sheep-skins, 
with your feet to the fire. What a situation ! 
IMidnight strikes ; all the cattle of the neigh- 
borhood go forth to pasture ; their lowings 
commingle with the voices of their conductors. 
It is midnight, — forget it not ; this is the mo- 
ment to hold deep communion with yourself, 
to meditate on the origin of Nature, and to 
taste its most exquisite delights. 

"On your return from a long walk, you are 
overtaken by the night ; you arrive by the 
light of the silvery rays in the perfect silence 
of the universe ; you have been oppressed by 
the burning heat of the dog-star ; you taste 
the delights of the evening freshness, and the 
salutary balm of meditation. 

"Your family is gone to bed, your lights 
are extinguished, but not your fire ; the cold 
and frosts of January obstruct vegetation in 
your garden. What do you for several hours ? 
I do not suppose that you wander forth, pos- 
sessed with the passion or ambition for 
wealth ; in what are you engaged ? You 
commune with yourself. 

" You know that the metropolitan church 
of St. Peter's at Rome is as large as a town ; 
a single lamp burns before the grand altar. 
You enter there at ten o'clock in the evening, 
and grope your way ; the feeble light does 
not enable you to see anything but itself ; you 
believe you are only entering when the morn- 
ing is already arrived ; Aurora sheds her light 
through the windows, and the paleness of the 
morning succeeds to the darkness of the night; 
you at length begin to think of retiring, but 
you have been there six hours ! Could I 
have written down your thoughts, how inter- 
esting to morality would they have been ! 

" Curiosity, the mother of life, has led you 
to embark for Greece ; you are driven by the 
currents on the isle of Monte Christo ; < t night 
you seek for shelter ; you traverse the little 
rock, and you find one upon a height, in the 



POLITICAL PRIZE ESSAY 



23 



midst of the ru'ms of an old monastery, behind 
a crumbling wall covered with ivy and rose- 
mary ; you arrange your tent ; you are sur- 
rounded on all sides by the mighty sea, and 
the hoarse roaring of its waves, as they dasli 
against the rocks, suggests to you the idea of 
this element so terrible to the feeble voyager. 
A light covering and a wall fifteen centuries 
old form your shelter ; you are excited by the 
agitation of sentiment. 

" Are you, at seven o'clock in the morning, 
in the midst of flowery thickets, or in a vast 
forest, during the season of fruit .' Are you 
asleep in a grotto surrounded by the waters of 
the Dryads, during the raging heat of the 
dog-star? You will pass whole hours alone, 
unable to tear yourself away from the scene 
or to bear the intrusion of those who come to 
interrupt your enjoyment. 

"He is not human who has not experi- 
enced the sweetness, the melancholy, the 
thrill which most of these situations afford. 
How deeply do I pity him, who cannot com- 
prehend, or has never been affected by, the 
electricity of Nature ! If sentiment made us 
experience these delightful emotions only, it 
would even then have done much for us ; it 
would have afforded us a succession of enjoy- 
ments without regrets, without fatigue, with- 
out any kind of violent excitement ; these 
would have been its precious gifts, had not 
patriotism, conjugal affection, ani divine 
friendship been also among the number of its 
bounties. 

"You return to your country after many 
years of absence ; you traverse the scenes of 
your youth, which were witnesses to the agi- 
tation which the first knowledge of men and 
the morning of passion produced in your 
senses. In a moment you live through the 
life of your youth, and participate in its plea- 
sures. You say you have a father, an affec- 
tionate mother, sisters still more innocent, 
brothers, at the *ametime friends ; O, happy 
man ! run, fly, lose not a moment ! Should 
death stop you on the way, you will not have 
known the delights of life, those of sweet 
gratitude, of tender respect, and of sincere 
friendship. But you say, ' I have a wife and 
children.' A wife and children ! It is too 
much, my dear friend, it is too much ; never 
leave them more. Pleasure would overwhelm 
you on your return, grief oppress you at your 
departure. A wife and children, father and 
mother, brothers and sisters, a friend ! And 
yet we complain of Nature and say, 'Why 
were we born ?' We submit with impatience 
to the transitory evils of life, and run with 
wild impetuosity after the emptiness of vanity 
and riches ! What, then, O unfortunate 
mortals, is the depraving draught, which has 
thus altered the inclination inscribed in your 
blood, your nerves', and your eyes? Had 
you a soul as ardent as the fires of Etna, if 
you had a father, a mother, a wife and chil- 
dren, you would have no reason to dread the 
anxieties and wearisomeness of life. 

" Yes, these are the only, the real pleasures 
of life, from which nothing can distract you. 
It is vain for man to surround himself with all 
the blessings of fortune. As soon as these 



sentiments fly from the heart, tedium seizes 
upon him, sadness, gloomy melancholy, and 
despair succeed ; and if this condition con- 
tinues, he relieves himself by death. 

" Pontavcri was torn away from Tahiti, 
conducted to Europe, watched with care, and 
loaded with attentions ; no means of distrac- 
tion were neglected or forgotten. One single 
object attracted his attention, and snatched 
him from the arms of grief. It was the mul- 
berry tree. He embraced it with transport, 
exclaiming, 'Tree of my country! tree of 
my country !' All that the court of Copen- 
hagen could offer was lavished in vain on five 
Greenlanders ; anxiety for their country and 
their family brought on melancholy, and 
melancholy was the precursor of death. In- 
stead of this, how many English, Dutch, and 
French are there, who live among savages ! 
These unhappy men were degraded in Europe, 
the sport of the passions, and the melancholy- 
refuse of the great, whilst the man of nature 
lives happily in the bosom of sentiment and 
natural reason. 

"We have now seen how sentiment en- 
ables us to enjoy ourselves, nature, our coun- 
try, and those who surround us. It remains 
to observe how it makes us thrill at the con- 
templation of the different vicissitudes of life. 
Here we become convinced, that if it makes 
us friends of what is lovely and just, it fills us 
with repugnance towards the oppressor and 
the wicked. 

"A young beauty has just entered her six- 
teenth year ; the roses on her cheeks are 
changed for the lily, the fire of her eyes is 
extinguished ; the vivacity of her graces de- 
generate into the languor of melancholy ; — 
she loves. Docs she inspire you with respect, 
with confidence ? It is the respect, the confi- 
dence, of sentiment. Does she inspire you 
with contempt for her weakness ? I3e it so ; 
but never utter it, if you value my esteem. 

" Nina loved ; her well-beloved died ; she 
would have died with him ; she survived him 
long, but only to remain faithful to him. 
Nina knew well that the object of her affec- 
tions was dead, but sentiment could not con- 
ceive of his annihilation. She waited for it 
always, she would wait for it still. You com- 
plain contemptuously of her folly. Harsh 
man I instead of that, feel esteem for her con- 
stancy and the tenderness of her heart. This- 
is the esteem and tenderness of sentiment. 

"An adored wife has died ; she was the 
wife of your enemy. The unfortunate hus- 
band is overwhelmed with his loss. He flees 
from the society of men ; the drapery of 
mourning displaces the garments of rejoicing. 
Two torches are upon the table. Despair is 
in his heart. Thus he passes the languishing 
remnant of his life. With a good soul, you 
feel your hatred appeased ; you run to her 
tomb, and lavish upon it marks of the recon- 
ciliation of sentiment. 

" You have read Tacitus ; which of yon 
has not cried out with Cato the younger, ' Let- 
some one give me a sword, that I may kill 
the monster' ? Now, at the expiration of two 
thousand years, the recital of the deeds of 
Marius, Sylla, Nero, Caligula, and Domitian, 



24 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE; 



excite feelings of apathy and repvrgnance. 
Their memory is that of hatred and execra- 
tion." 

Flattered by the praises bestowed upon his 
prize essay, Bonaparte commenced a " His- 
tory of Corsica," which he intended to have 
dedicated to the Abbe Raynal. Quartered 
at the iiouse of a Valencian bookseller, who 
allowed him to peruse the works on his 
shelves, the young Lieutenant pushed his 
studies beyond the limits of his profession, 
into the regions of ecclesiastical history, and 
Roman jurisprudence. Animated by an ar- 
dent desire to enrich his mind by every 
means within his power, he never slighted 
any opportunity that presented itself for 
study. Asked at St. Helena how it was pos- 
sible he had become so familiarized with the 
intricacy of law as to have conceived the 
"Code Napoleon," he replied: " When I 
was merely a lieutenant, at Valence, I was 
put under arrest — unjustly, it is true, but 
that is nothing to the point. The little room 
which was assigned for my prison, contiined 
no other furniture but an old chair, an old 
bed, and an old cupboard; — in the cupboard, 
however, was a ponderous folio volume, old- 
er and more worm-eaten than all the rest ; it 
proved to be the Roman Digest of laws. As 
I had no paper, pens, ink, or pencils, you 
may easily imagine that this book was a val- 
uable prize to me. It was so voluminous, 
and the leaves were so covered with marginal 
notes in manuscript, that, had I been con- 
fined a hundred years, I should never have 
been idle. I was only ten days deprived of 
my liberty — but, on recovering it, I was sat- 
urated with Justinian and the decisions of the 
Roman legislators. Thus it was that I picked 
up my knowledge of civil law."* 

Madame Colombier, a wealthy widow la- 
dy, whose house was the most fashionable 
resort in Valence, was struck with the young 
Lieutenant's strong and brilliant faculties. 
Under her patronage he was introduced into 
society, and shook off many of his unsocial 
habits, although he never neglected his stud- 
ies, even when he conceived an attachment 
for the daughter of his kind friend. Mad- 
emoiselle du Colombier was about his own 
age, and their affection — .judging from his ac- 
count of it in after years, — was truly 
" Love's young dream." "We were (he 
said) the most innocent creatures imagina- 
ble — we contrived short interviews together 
— I well remember one which took place on 
a midsummer morning, just as daylight began 
to dawn. It will scarcely be believed that all 
our happiness consisted in eating cherries to- 
gether !" 

This " first love," pure as the dew on the 
cherries, proved to be as transient, and when 
the fond pair met again, (it was at Lyons, in 
1805,) there was a wide social difi'erence be- 
tween the Emperor Napoleon and the humble 
Madame de Bressieux. It was with difficul- 
ty that she obtained access to her old admir- 
er, but she found him grateful for the kind- 
ness which her deceased mother had evinced 



Coaversatione. — O'Meara. 



towards him. He appointed Monsieur de 
Bressieux Tobacco Inspector at Lyons, and 
bestowed on his old sweetheart the lucrative 
situation of Lady of Honor to his sister 
Pauline. 

Ordered with his company from Valence 
to Lyons, in consequence of popular disturb- 
ances, Bonaparte was for some months an 
attentive observer in the most revolutionary 
of French cities. Oppressed by misrule, and 
denied that protection which all good govern- 
ments give to the manufacturing interests, 
the Lyonnais boldly discussed the doctrine of 
divine right. Every post from Paris brought 
philosophical essays, recommended to the 
hearts of the people by their wit, energy, 
learning, and novelty of subject. The crimes 
of the Capet dynasty were denounced — the 
claims of the people to be governed for their 
good were asserted — the sophisms, avarice, 
and ignorance of a bigotted and intolerant 
clergy were detected and exposed. 

A king who could have profited by these 
new lessons, who could have imbued himself ' 
with the full spirit of liberty, and the perfect 
consciousness of right which were now man- 
ifested, might have held his seat, have been 
obeyed and immortalised as the saviour of his 
country. Louis was a different character. 
With the best wishes, he had not the knowl- 
edge necessary to secure the happiness of his 
people. Positive of his hereditary rights, he 
was blind to his ignorance — he could not be 
persuaded that he must be taught how to gov- ■' 
em a great nation, or yield the reins to those ; 
who had the skill to guide it — but the cup of ' 
aggression was full, and soon ran over. The • 
people were not so enlightened as to be able t 
constitutionally to improve the existing order 
of things, but they saw the necessity and felt . 
the power to destroy and to re-model it. At : 
Lyons, as throughout France, individuals saw 
this necessity and felt this power. Their ' 
ideas were communicated — clubs were form- ■ 
ed — and combination produced its natural 11 
effect. I 

Louis, who, at his succession, felt in some ■ 
degree the popular wants, and appeared anx- 
ious to meet them, by employing popular' 
ministers and issuing popular ordinances, was 
overpowered by the influence of his queen, 
the unceasing efforts of the noblesse and the 
privileged clergy, and by the conviction that 
every advance he made towards concession 
appeared to render the people more eager in 
their demands and more unsatisfied with 
their situation. He was disgusted with the ill 
success of his eflforts. Marie Antoinette and 
the courtiers laughed at his failures, and I 
lured him from his patriotic career to the 
frivolities of the court, and the arbitrary! 
measures that usually emanate from extrava- 
gance and folly. Every courier from Paris 
carried news of masques, revels, and dissi- 
pation, into towns where thousands lacked 
the necessities of life. It was not strange, 
then, that Napoleon's anti-monarchical opin- 
ions were strengthened during his residence 
among the destitute silk-weavers of Lyons. 

The assembly of the "States-General" 
at Versailles, on the 5th of May, 1789, has 



THE FRENCH COURT 



been called by historians the first day of the 
Revolution. Gouverneur Morris, who was 
then in France, (prosecuting a claim of Rob- 
ert Morris against the Farmers Cieneral lor a 
shipment of tobacco,) described this funereal 
ceremony over the Capet dynasty, in the fol- 
lowing letter to a female relative in Phila- 
delphia : 

" I had the honor to be present on the fifth 
of this month at the opening of the States- 
General ; a spectacle niore solemn to the 
mind, than gaudy to the e.ye. And yet, there 
was displayed everything of noble and of 
royal in this titled country. A great number 
of fine women, and a very great number of 
fine dresses, ranged round the Hall. On a 
kind of stage the throne ; on the left of the 
King, and a little below bin), the Queen ; a 
little behinel him to the right, and on chairs, 
the Princes of the blood ; on the right and 
left, at some distance from the throne, the va- 
rious Princesses, with the gentlemen and la- 
dies of their retinue. Advanced on the stage, 
to the left of the throne, the Keeper of the 
Seals. Several officers of the household, 
richly caparisoned, strewed about in diflerent 
places. Behind the throne, a cluster of 
guards, of the largest size, dressed in ancient 
costumes, taken from the times of chivalry. 
In front of the throne on the right, below the 
stage, ihe IMinisters of state, with a large ta- 
ble before them. Oh the opposite side of the 
hall some benches, on which sat the Mare- 
chals of France, and other great otlicers. lu 
front of the Ministers, on benches facing the 
opposite side of the hall, sat the Representa- 
tives of the Clergy, being priests of all col- 
ors, scarlet, crimson, black, white, and grey, 
to the number of three hundred. In front of 
the Marechals of France, on benches facing 
the Clergy, sat an equal number of Represen- 
tatives of the Nobility, dressed in a robe of 
black, waistcoats of cloth of gold, and over 
their shoulders, so as to hang forward to their 



his genuflexions to the throne, and nirnjblcd 
out, in a very ungraceful maimer, ;. spe3cli 
of considerable length, which noliody pre- 
tends to judge of, because nobody Inward it. 
He was succeeded by M. Necker, who soon 
handed his speech to his clerk, being unable 
to go through with it. The clerk delivered h 
much better than the IMinister, and that is no 
great praise. It was three hours long, con- 
tained many excellent things, but too much 
of compliment, too iinich of repetition, and 
indeed too much of everything, for it was too 
long by two hours, and yet fell short in some 
capital points of great expectation. He re- 
ceived, however, very repeated plaudits from 
the audience, some of which were merited, 
Init more were certainly paid to his charac- 
ter, than to his composition. M. Necker's 
long speech now comes to a close, and the 
King rises to depart. The Hall resounds 
with a long loud Vive h Roi. He passes 
the Queen, who rises to follow him. At this 
moment some one, imbued with the milk of 
human kindness, originates a faint Vive la 
Reine. She makes a humble courtesy and 
presents the sinking of the high .Austrian 
spifit ; a livelier acclamation in return, and 
to this her lowlier bending, which is succeed- 
ed by a shout of loud applause. Here drops 
the curtain on the first great act of this great 
drama, in which a Bourbon gives freedom. 
His courtiers seem to feel, what he seems to 
be insensible of, the pang of greatness going 
off." 

On the 17th of June, the " third estate " 
or popular branch of the States-General, (af- 
ter having in vain invited the " nobles " and 
the "prelates" to join them,) constituted 
themselves into a National. Assembly. 
The King, during an excursion with Marie 
Antoinette and her courtiers, resolved to put 
down this revolutionary demonstration by 
force, and on the 20th of June the " third es- 
tate " found their hall closed by royal order. 



waists, a kind of lappels, about a quarter of i They immediately repaired to a large build 



a yard wide at the top, and wider at bottom, 
made of cloth of gold. On benches, which 
reached quite across the hall, and facing the 
stage, sat the Representatives of the People, 
clothed in black. In the space between the 
Clergy and Nobles, directly in front of the 
Representatives of the People, and facing the 
throne, stood the heralds at arms, with their 
staves, and in very rich dresses. 



ing used for playing tennis-ball, and there, en- 
closed by bare walls, with heads uncovered, 
and a spontaneous burst of enthusiasm, made 
a solemn vow, never to .separate until they 
had given France a Constitution. 

On the 23d, the King tried his power to 
dissolve the Assembly which he had inaugu- 
rated with pomp and ceremony, but although 
the nobility and clergy obeyed, the deputies 



When the Kiiig entered, he was saluted i of the people sat still. " Go tell your mas- 
vvith a shout of applause. Some time after ter," said Mirabeau to the officer who order- 
he had taken his seat, he put on a round bea- ■ ed the deputies to disperse, "that we are 
ver, ornamented with white plumes, the part , here by oreler of the people; and that we 
in front turned up, with a large diamond but- | shall not retire but at the point of the bayo 



ton in the centre. He read his speech well 
and was interrupted at a part, which affected 
his audience, by a loud shout of Vive le 
Roi. After this had subsided, he finished 
his speech, and received again an animated 
acclamation of applause. He then took off 
his hat, and after a while put it on again, at 
which the Nobles also put on their hats, which 
resembled the King's, excepting the button. 
The ell'ect of this display of plumage was 
fine. 

" The Keeper of the Seals then performed 



net."*"' An armed insurrection broke out at 
Paris on the 11th of July, and on Tuesday 
the 14th, the Bastile was taken by the popu- 
lace. Earth was lightened of a load that op- 
pressed it, nor did this ghastly object any 
longer startle the sight, like an ugly spider 
lying in wait for its accustomed prey, and 
brooding in sullen silence over the wrongs 
which it had the will, though not the power 
to inflict. t 



* Louis Blanc considers this apocryplial. 
t Life of Napoleon. — Haililt. 



26 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 



Oil the 1st of June, 1789, Bonapart* was 
ordered from Lyons to Auxonne, wliere there 
was a Royal school of Artillery. Politics 
continued to occupy his attention, and the 
stirring events at Paris but fanned his oppo- 
sition to royalty, though his letters show that 
he thought more of securing the blessings of 
liberty to Corsica than to I'rance. A bitter 
epistle to Buttafoco, the Corsican deputy of 
the nobles in the Assembly, was republished 
by the patriotic club of " Ajaccio," who un- 
der its influence, passed a resolution, attach- 
ing the epithet " infamous " to the name of 
this noble representative. The following 
characteristic letter, addressed to Gen. Paoli, 
(then an exile in England,) exhibits the Cor- 
sican " Vendetta'" of the writer, with a 
democratic spirit which places the political 
opinions of tlie future Emperor in a clear 
light :— 

" General — I was born when my country 
was perishing. Thirty thousand Frenchmen 
landed upon our coast, bathing the throne of 
liberty with streams of blood. Such was 
the odious spectacle which first presented it- 
self to my sight. The cries of the dying, 
the groans of tlie oppressed, the tears of des- 
pair, were the companions of my infant days. 
You quitted our island, and with you disap- 
peared all hopes of happiness ; slavery was 
the reward of our submission. Loaded with 
the triple chain of the soldier, the legislator, 
and the tax-gatherer, our countrymen lived 
despised by those who have the conniiand 
over us. Is it not the greatest pain that one 
who has the slightest elevation of sentiment 
can suffer .' Can the wretched Peruvian, 
writhing under the tortures of the avaricious 
Spaniard, feel a greater ? No I Wretches, 
whom a desire of gain and plunder corrupts, 
to justify themselves, have invented calum- 
nies against the National Government, and 
against you, sir, in particular ; authors, con- 
fiding in their veracity, transmit them to pos- 
terity. While perusing them, my heart boils 
with indignation, ar.d I have resolved to dis- 
sipate these delusions, the ofl'spring of igno- 
rance. An early study of the French lan- 
guage, long observation, and the memorials 
to which I have had access in the portfolios 
of the patriots, have led ine to promise my- 
self some success. I wish to compare your 
government with the present one. I wish to 
blacken with the pencil of dishonor those 
who have betrayed the common cause ; I 
wish to call before the tribunal of public 
opinion those who are in power ; set forth 
their vexatious proceedings, expose their se- 
cret intrigues, and, if possible, interest the 
present virtuous minister in the deplorable 
situation that we are now in. If my fortune 
permitted me to live in the capital, I should 
have found out other means of making known 
our complaints ; but being obliged to serve 
in the army, I find myself thus compelled to 
make use of this, the only means of publici- 
ty ; for, as to private memorials, either they 
would not reach the government, or, stifled 
by the clamors of the parties concerned, 
they would only occasion the ruin of the au- 
thor. 



" Still young, my enterprise may seem 
daring ; but love for truth, of my country 
and fellow citizens, that enthusiasm which 
the prospect of an amelioration in our state 
always gives, bears me up. If you. Gener- 
al, condescend to approve of a work in 
which your name will so often occur, if you 
condescend to encourage the eftorts of a 
young rnan whom you have known from in- 
fancy, and whose parents were always at- 
tached to the good cause, I shall dare to au- 
gur favorably of my success. I hoped at one 
time to be able to go to London, to express 
to 3 ou the sentiments you have raised in my 
bosom, and to converse together on the mis- 
fortunes of our country ; but the distance is 
an objection ; perhaps a time will come 
when I shall be able to overcome it. What- 
ever may be the success of my undertaking, 
I know that it will raise against me the nu- 
merous body of Frenchmen who govern our 
island, and whom I attack ; but what matters 
it, so as the welfare of my country is con- 
cerned .' I shall hear the wicked upbraid; 
and if the bolt fall, I shall examine my heart 
and shall recollect the lawfulness of my mo- 
tives, and at that moment I shall defy it. 

"Permit me. General, to ofler you the 
homage of myfamilj' — why should I not add, 
of my countrymen ? They sigh at the re- 
collection of a time when they had hoped for 
liberty. My mother, Madame Laetitia, has 
charged me, above all, to recall to your re- 
membrance the years long since passed at 
Corte. I remain with respect, General, 
Your most humble 

And most obedient servant. 
Napoleon Bonaparte, 
Officer in the regiment of La Fere." 

In reply to this letter. Gen. Paoli furnished 
his young countryman with valuable materi- 
als for the work upon which he was occupied, 
and it was soon completed. Monsieur Joly, 
a printer at Dole, had published Napoleon's 
" Letter to Buttafoco," and was invited to 
Auxonne, in order to make arrangements for 
publishing the "History of Corsica." Cir- 
cumstances prevented the execution of the 
contract, and Sir Walter Scott says : " the 
work on Corsica was never printed, nor has 
a trace of it been discovered." This is an 
error. Napoleon had the manuscript at St. 
Helena, and sent it with other valuable doc- 
uments to Cardinal Fesch. In 1840 it was 
the property of M. Libri, an officer in the 
French Department of public instruction. 

It was the steady aim of the author of 
Waverley to represent Napoleon as originally 
" na indigent adventurer," and to give a 
mean coloring to his early life. He accord- 
ingly states that M. Joly, on visiting Aux- 
onne, " found the future Emperor in a naked 
barrack room, the sole furniture of which 
consisted of a wretched bed without curtains, 
a table placed in the embrasure of a win- 
dow, loaded with books and papers, and two 
chairs. His brother Louis, whom he was 
teaching mathematics, lay on a wretched 
mattress in an adjoining closet." In answer 



PECUNIARY CIRCUMSTANCES 



27 



lo which, Louis Bonaparte observes :* " This \ 
passage contains ahiiost as many fulsehoods ' 
as lilies. I recollect very well that, on my 
account, a larger and more commodious i 
apartment was assigned to my brother than' 
to the other olticers of his rank. The furni- 
ture could not be either better or worse than 
that of his comrades, because they were ail 
in barracks, and of course lodged and fur- 
nished by the state. I remember that I had 
a very good chamber, and an excellent bed. 
My brother directed my studies, but I had 
projier masters, cveri in literature.'' We al- 
so find that Napoleon prepared Louis fcu' his 
confirmation in the Ivouian Catholic church, 
and so strong was the respect of the young 
Lieutenant for religious observances, that he 
was entrusted with the altar furniture of the 
regiment, when tiie otlico of chaplain was 
abolished. 

Promoted lo a 1st liiiutenaucy in the regi- 
ment of Grcnobks (the 4th artillery,) he 
joined it at Valence. Obtaining a short 
leave of absence, he made an excursion with 
a comrade into Burgundy, and stopping at 
Nuits, they were invited to pass the evening 
with .M. Gassendi, (a captain of their regi- 
ment,) who had married the daughter of a 
physician residing there. Gassendi was a 
royalist, his father-in-law a patriot. Their 
opposition was displayed by a warm discus- 
sion at supper, in which Bonaparte's superi- 
or intelligence and logic were so efiicient on 
the side of the doctor, that he visited his 
guest next morning in his chamber, and 
thanked him in flattering terms for his inter- 
posiiion. The eloquence and patriotism of 
the young olheer, became the subject of con- 
versation in the town. It was Sunday, and 
when he walked out, the people in the streets 
pulled o(f their hats to him as the champion 
of their cause. But ihe triumph of the morn- 
ing was 0%'ercast at night. He was invited 
to pass the evening at the house of Madame 
Mery, a lady of wealth and fashion, who en- 
tertained all the aristocracy of the district.' 
Here having expressed some of his opinions, 
they were assailed and reprobated with the 
utmost violence. He attempted a war of 
words, but overpowered by noise and num- 
bers^ was able to extricate himself only hj' 
the assistance of his hostess, who gracefully 
parried the blows which he could not resist. 
This incident, though it mnrtified him for the 
moment, contributed still farther to connect 
his name and feelings with the cause of the 
people. Of this trip, in which his curiosity 
and friendship were both gratified, and 
which appears to have been the last as wel 
as the first he ever performed from mere mo- 
tives of pleasure, his recollection was so 
agreeable, that he conceived for the moment 
an idea of writing a description of it after the 
manner of Sterne, and spoke of it in after 
life with peculiar complacency, calling it his 
sentimental journey. \ 

In September, 1791, Bonaparte received a 
furlough, and hastened to Corsica, where he 



* Reiily to Scott. 

t Life of Niipoleon,'— /^ee. 



received a warm welcome frnin his proud 
mollier. She never went out unless accom- 
panied by her soldier-son in full uniform, and 
endeavored to negotiate a marriage, which 
would have made Napoleon a wealthy l)ride- 
groom. 

'!'he young Lieutenant's heart was not to 
be caught with golden bait, and his love for 
Corsica left no room for other aflections. 
Gen. Paoli had appeared at the bar of the 
National Constituent Assembly, (at Paris,) 
and hud entreated, in the name of the people 
of Corsica, that they might be irrevocably 
united, by a legislative decree, to the French, 
nation. 'J'he then all-powerful Mirabeau ad- 
vocating this request, Corsica was iniinediate- 
ly "annexed," as an eiglity-lhird depart- 
ment, to Fr;uice. Gen. Paoli was appointed 
Coannander-in-chief of the militia, and he 
selected his young friend Bonaparte as Major- 
Commandant of the battalion at Ajaccio. 

For the first time since the death of her 
husband, Madame Bonaparte had her children 
under their domestic roof. .Iose|i!), the old- 
est son, had graduated with honor at the col- 
lege of Autun, in France, and on his return 
had received the appointment of President of 
the Ajaccio Court of Common Pleas; — Liicieii 
had also returned, a zealous revolutionist, and 
was the orator of a democratic club; tlie other 
children were at school. All looked up to 
Napoleon with reverential afioction, and his 
brother Louis, alluding to this ascendancy 
many years afterwards, said: "It was in 
his own family that Napoleon began to exhib- 
it his great superiority — not after glory and 
power had elevated iiim, hut in his early 
youth." 

The emigration of royalist otHcers made a 
general promotion necessary, and Bonaparte 
received a commission as captain in the 4th 
Regiment of Foot Artillery, dated February 
(Jth, 1792. His name iiad been placed on 
the list some month's previous, by Monsienr 
Duportail, then Minister of ^Var, who had 
served in the American Revolution as an of- 
ficer of Engineers,* and was a member of the 
same !\Iasoiiic Lodge. The name of Captain 
Bonaparte is on a list of olhcers destined for 
the army invading Flanders under Count Ro- 
chambeau,t but Monsieur de Narbonne re- 
placing Duportail in the Department of War, 
the young Corsican was overlooked. He 
was not idle, however, and the battalion of 
Ajaccio, under his command, was the most 
efiicient and the best drilled corps in the Cor- 
sican militia. 

Meanwhile English intrigue hhd seduced 
Gen Paoli from his allegiance. He had ac- 
cepted the amnesty held out by the law of 
the National Assembly, and had also accept 
ed an appointment of high trust and honor 



* After leaving the Ministry, Monsieur Diipnrtfiil 
was proscribed, and to escape the guillotine he lied 
to America, where he remained until 1802, and died 
on his passage back to France. • 

t The commander of the French troops sent over 
during tlie American Revolution. It was to avoid 
wounding his military susceptibility that General 
Washington was created " Field Marshal of France 
and Navarre." 



28 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 



under the Republic, but suLldeiily manifested 
a willingness to yield the provnice committed 
to his superintendence, to a hostile nation. 
Scott extols this treacheroijs " opposition to 
the prevailing infection of Jacobinism," as 
nobly contrasted with the conduct of that 
portion of the Corsicans, who continued 
faithful to the allegiance oi their own choice. 
The loyal baronet of Abbotsford, (to use the 
words of a coteniporary writer,) appears to 
esteem perjury and treason in favor of Eng- 
land the first and highest duties of a French 
citizen. 

On Good Friday, the Vicar of Ajaccio took 
occasion in his discourse to rebuke this disre- 
gard of sacred obfigations. His conservative 
sentiments maddened the English faction, 
and a party of rioters v^'ould have pulled 
down the vicarage the next day, had not 
Captain Bonaparte, at the head of his bat- 
talion, promptly hastened to the spot, and 
dispersed the mob at the point of the bayonet. 
Peraldi, the leader of the discomtitted rioters, 
had an old vendetta against the Bonapartes, 
and lost no time in denouncing Napoleon as 
the secret instigator of the riot which he had 
openly quelleil. This accusation, prompted 
by vengeance, was unsupported by truth. 
But it renderetl a journey to Paris advisable, 
where, though the sanguinary temj)er of pow 
ei was beginning to encourage delation, Bo- 
naparte found no dilliculty in vindicating his 
conduct. 

Meeting Bourrienne, with whom he had 
been intimate while at the military college, 
Bonaparte remained some months at the 
French capital, and the two young men wit- 
nessed the insurrection of the 20th of June. 
" We met by appointment, (says Bourri- 
enne,) at a restaurateur's, in the Rue St. 
Honore, near the Palais-Royal. On going 
out, we saw a mob approaching, in the di- 
rection of the market-place, which Bonaparte 
estimated at from five to six thousand men. 
They were a parcel of blackguards, armed 
with weapons of every description, and 
shouting the grossest abuse, whilst they pro- 
ceeded at a rapid rate toward the Tuilleries. 
This mob appeared to consist of the vilest 
and most profligate of the population of the 
suburbs. ' Let us follow the rabble,' said 
Bonaparte. We got the start of them, and 
took up our station on the terrace, bordering 
the river. It was there thit he was an eye- 
witness of the scandalous scenes that ensued ; 
and it would be ditficult to describe the sur- 
prise and indignation which they excited in 
him. Such weakness and forbearance, he 
said, could not be excused; but when the 
king showed himself at a window which 
looked out upon the garden, with the red cap, 
which one of the mob had just placed upon 
his head, he could no longer repress his in- 
dignation ; ' What madness !' he loudly ex- 
claimed ; ' how could they allow that rabble 
to enter ? why do they not sweep away four 
or five hundred of them with the cannon ? 
and then the rest would take themselves oft 
very quickly.' When we sat down to din- 
ner, he discussed with great good sense the 
causes and consequences of this unrepressed 



insurrection. He foresaw, and developed 
with sagacity, all that would follow, and in 
this he was not mistaken."* 

Napoleon was still more shocked by the 
sanguinary excesses of the 10th of August — 
" that awful night, when the despotic nion 
archy of a thousand years went down, like 
some imposing ship of war, in the midst of 
hurricane and tempest, never to raise its head 
in France."! The brave and immolated 
Swiss Guards, Iheir bodies lying in heaps on 
the pavement of ihe court, and their heads 
paraded about on pikes by demons in human 
shape, struck him with horror, and presented 
a spectacle which he remembered as "hide- 
ous and revolting." Instinct with heroic 
fire, his soul shuddered at scenes of cruelty 
and murder, and his just understanding re- 
garded the violence of a mob as the ferocity 
of a monster. t 

Governeur Jlorris — Minister Plenipotenti- 
ary of the United States to France — was a 
federalist of the Washingtonian school, and 
sympathised with the unfortunate monarch. 
Early in July, he had counselled the Royal 
family to escape from Paris, and arrange- 
ments for their flight were made at his resi- 
dence, No. 488 in the Rue de La Planche.§ 
On the 10th of August, IVfessrs. de Monceil, 
Bremond and de Coigny, who were concern- 
ed in this scheme, together with the Count 
d'Estaing, and others who had served in the 
American army, hastened to Mr. Morris, 
with their families, and asked his diplomatic 
protection. It was granted, and the chival- 
rous American remarked to a countryman — 
" I have no doubt, sir, but there are persons 
on the watch, who would find fault with my 
conduct as IMinister, in receiving and protect- 
ing these people, but I call on you to witness 
the declaration, which I now make, and that 
is, that they were not invited to my house, 
but came of their own accord; whether my 
house will be a protection to them, or to me, 
God only knows, but I will not turn them out 
of it, let what will happen to me ;" to which 
he added, " you see, sir, they are all per- 
sons to whom our country' is more or less in- 
debted, and it would be inhuman to force 
them into the hands of the assassins, had 
they no such claim upon me."|| 

To the greater portion of the Parisians, 
this conduct of Mr. Morris gave great dis- 
pleasure, which was increased by a disposi- 
tion on the part of the American Government 
to defer the payment of the national debt due 



* Bourrieniie's Memoir. 

t Lamartiiie's Giroiidins. 

i Lee's Napoleon. 

§ Mr. Morris acted as treasurer of tlie part)-, ami 
wlien the catastrophe of the 10th of August destroy- 
ed all hopes of success, he had in his possession 
748,000 livres touriiois belonging to Louis XVL A 
part of these funds he employed in aiding notable 
Royalists to escape, and after his lecall (in 1796,) 
he repaired to Vienna, to render an account of his 
stewardship to the daughter of Ihe unfortunate king, 
(afterwards the Duchesse d'Angoiileme,) and to pay 
her the balance which reinanied in his hands. As 
he passed through London on his mission, he nobly 
opened a credit of fifteen hundred pounds sterling, 
for the use of Louis Philippe, of Orleans, who was 
much embarrassed in his pecuniary circumstances. 

II Life of Morris. — Spar/cs. 



THE UNITED STATES. 



29 



France, to the Revolutionists. Tiio unlii(;I;y 
use of the diplomatic phrase " ma cour,'^ in 
referring to his own government, sounded so 
harshly in the ears of these newly fledged 
Repuhlicans, that they added injury to insult. 
Mr. Morris was at one time arrested in the 
street because lie had not a Police passport in 
his pocket — a few days afterwards his house 
was entered by a band of armed policemen, 
although by the laws of nations it w;is ex- 
empted from such intrusions — and again, on 
a short journey into the country, he was ar- 
rested and sent baclv, under pretence that his 
passpo4-t was out of date. These insults, it 
is true, were followed bv apologies, but they 
came with a reluctance that showed little love 
for the United States. Even the sacred 
name of Washington was calunu-iiated by the 
infuriated demagogues, because in an otticial 
letter to the l<ii)g, he had spoken of "your 
■people,'" instead of using tlie more republi- 
can term " citizens." On one occasion a 
radical journal informed its readers that there 
was " a statue of that moiuuxhical despot of 
tiie Western Republic — Washington — at a 
studio on the boulevard," and recommended 
its decapitation, as " a warning to the diplo- 
matic minion of Madame Veto." 

Bonaparte was thus, early in life, preju- 
diced against the United States, by poi)ular 
report — nor were his associates men who 
were favorably disposed towards the govern- 
ment at Philadelphia. Thomas Paine, an 
English infidel, who claimed the title of the 
" Apostle of America," and Edmund C. Ge- 
net, who afterwards made so much trouble 
as Minister of the French Republic, under 
Washington's administration, were constant- 
ly at a literary club which the young captain 
of Artillery visited dailv — and both of these 
worthies have left behind many proofs of their 
hostilit}' to the " Father of his Country." 

Not obtaining a post in the French army 
on the frontier, Bonaparte returned to Corsi- 
ca in September, 1792, and resumed the 
command of his battalion. In December a 
squadron arrived, commanded by Vice-Ad- 
miral Truguet, who had been selected to con- 
quer Sardinia. Bonaparte was ordered to 
march with his battalion to the straits of Bon- 



met Barberi, who complained ihat he never 
saw me, and proposed an excursion of pleas- 
ure. I consented, on condition that it should 
be on the water. lie nuide a signal to tiie 
sailors on board a vessel of which he was a 
proprietor ; they came, and we set out. I 
wanted to measure the extent of the gulf, and 
made them direct their course to theRecanto. 
I placed myself at the stern, undid my ball 
of packthread, and obtained the result which 
I wished for. Arrived at Costa, we ascend- 
ted it ; the position was magnificent; it is the 
same that the English afterwards surmounted 
with a redoubt; it commanded Ajaccio. I 
was desirous to examine it : Barberi, who 
took little interest in researches of this kind, 
pressed me to have don 3 ; I strove to divert 
him and gain time, but appetite made him 
deaf. If f spoke to liim of the width of the 
bay, he replied that he had not yet breakfast- 
ed : if of the church-steeple, 'of such or such 
a house, which I could reach with my bomb- 
shells, ' Good,' he said; ' but I am in haste, 
and an excellent breakfast awaits me ; let us 
go by all means !' We did so, but his friends 
were tired of waiting for him ; so that on his 
arrival he found neither guests nor banquet. 
lie resolved to be more cautious in future, and 
to mind the hour when he went on a recon- 
noitring party." 

Paoli soon became openly hostile to France, 
and was encouraged in his treason by the 
Roman Catholic priests, who found that the 
Revolution was fast undermining their ])ov.-- 
er. Napoleon and Lucien Bonaparte, how- 
ever, preferred the country of their adoption 
to English allegiance, despite the eflbrts of 
Paoli, who implored them, in the name of his 
old friend, their father, to espouse his cause. 
The microscopic scene of Corsica was too 
narrow for the daring young soldier, who as- 
pired to " a kingdom for a stage, and nations 
to behold the swelling act." His profession- 
al pride and instinctive feeling were affected, 
(as he says,) with antipatlnj for the treason- 
able project of Paoli, and as vigorous plants 
shoot upward to the sun, his genius, which 
would have been imprisoned in the contracted 
circuit of his native isle, gravitated towards 
the important events of France, and the 



ifacio, and to feign an attack on that side of the ; powerful emotions which produced them.* 
island, while the Admiral, with his fleet, di- 
rected operations against Cagiiari. The ex- 
pedition was defeated, but Bonaparte, not 
content with making a diversion, took sever- 
al batteries. The failure of the Admiral 
made it impossible for him to retain the posi- 
tio;is he had taken, but he retreated with so 
much discretion as to win high honors. 

A passion for military glory is inseparable 
from great military talents, and Bonaparte's 



The last interview between Paoli and Bo- 
napirte terminated in hard words, and as the 
latter was retracing his steps homeward, he 
was taken prisoner in a mounlain pass by 
some of Paoli's guard. Confined for the 
night in a cottage, he escaped in female at- 
tire brought him by a servant-maid, and suc- 
ceeded in joining the French troops at Calvi, 
Bastia. When the news of this attempt to 
capture Napoleon reached .Ajaccio, the Rev- 



ambition was so fired by his first campaign, olutionary club of that city determined to ask 



that he pursued his military studies with in- 
creased assiduity. " I was as yet, (he said 
at St. Helena,) only a captain : I foresaw 
that the war would be long and sanguinary: 
I prepared myself for it. I had fixed my 
study in the quietest part of the house ; I had, 
in fact, gotson the roof; I saw no one, sel- 
dom went out, but studied hard. One Sun- 
day morning, as I was crossing the pier, I 



'inforcement of troops from France. A 
deputation was chosen, of which Lucien Bo- 
naparte was chairman, and they sailed at 
once for Marseilles. 

This enraged the partizans of Paoli, and 
they declared they would eradicate the Bo- 
naparte family. Madame Bonaparte had 



Life of Napoleon. — I.ee. 



80 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE : 



witli lier live small children, !)at displayed 
that firm and courageous spirit which had 
characterized her early years, during the war 
of independence. She despatched nuinerous 
messengers to Joseph and Najxileon, hoping 
to receive their protection, but awakened 
suddenly in the middle of the next night, she 
beheld her chamber tilled with armed men. 
Her first thought was that she had been sur- 
prised by her enemies, but by the light of a 
fir torch carried by the leader of the party, 
she saw Costa, chief of the piei-e of Bastel- 
ica, her devoted friends. A hunter of his 
dan had encountered a numerous band of 
Paoli's troops, on their way to Ajaccio, with 
orders to take all the Bonaparte fimily pris- 
oners, and to destroy their properly. Hast 
ening with the tidings to Bastelica, the clan 
was soon aroused, and three hundred armed 
men, headed by their chief, had nuide a 
forced march, which enabled them to reach 
Ajaccio first. " Quick, make haste, Signo- 
ra Letizia, (said Costa,) Paoli's men are 
close upon you — you have not a moment to 
lose. Thank Heaven, I am here with all my 
men, and will save you or perish in the at- 
tempt." 

Rising up in haste, Madame Bonaparte 
mid her children half clothed themselves, and 
hurried out into the street, where they were 
placed on horseback, in the centre of (7osta"s 
colunm. Leaving the ciiy without awaken- 
ing the inhabitants, the fugitives entered into 
the deepest recesses of the mountain forests, 
and halted in a chestnut grove, from whence 
the city was visible. On one occasion a 
scouting party of the etiemy traversed a 
neighboring valley, and the iinfortunale fam- 
ily could ])lainly hear (he threats of their ex- 
asperated pursuers. In the afternoon, a thick 
column of smoke was seen to arise from the 
middle of the city. " They are burning 
your house, Signora Letizia !" said the brave 
Costa. "Ah! never mind! (she replied,) 
we vi'il! build it up again much better — Vii:e 
la France." Two night-marches, and the 
Spartan mother and her young flock were 
joyously welcomed on board of a French 
frigate by Napoleon and Josei)h. "Thus, 
(said Lucien, in narrating the above facts,) 
the rage of our enemies was reduced to ex- 
pend itself upon the stores of our house." 

The decree of banishment against the Bo- 
napartes, which followed the confiscation of 
their property, made Napoleon an active al- 
ly of the French troops, who were directed 
by Salicetti and La Combe, Representatives 
of the people. On one occasion Bonaparte 
was sent from Calvi to surprise Ajaccio. He 
embarked in a frigate, and landing on the 
north side of the gulf wilh a party of fifty 
men, took possession of a fort called the 
Torre I'i Capitello. He had no sooner car- 
ried this point, than ihe frigate was driven to 
sea by a gale. While thus insulated and un 
supported, the insurgents attacked him with 
great violence, by land and water. He de- 
fended himself with spirit, and with such 
pertinacity, that he and his hemic little gar- 
rison were reduced to lations of horse-flesh. 
During the siege, lie called out from tiie walls 



to a parly, and harangued his misguided 
countrymen in a strain of eloquence so im- 
pressive that he made many converts. After 
five days of conflict and starvation, the frig- 
ate returned to her station, and he re-enibark- 
ed, having first partially blown up the fort. 
He himself mentions, that in one of his land- 
ings, he got a few guns ashore, and with a 
round or two of grapeshot, dispersed a body 
of the insurgents who opposed him. They 
returned to the attack, however, and mixed 
reproaches with their warfare, expressing in- 
dignation that he, a Corsican, should be fight- 
ing for France. In order to make themselves 
both seen and heard, they ascended the 
neighboring hills, and even mounted up into 
trees. Bonaparte had a gun loaded with 
ball, and aimet' it so well, that he cut oft' a 
limb on which one of those exclusive patriots 
was perched. His fall, which created a gen- 
eral laugh, was followed by the instant flight 
of his party.* 

Lord Hood, the English Admiral, took pos- 
session of Corsica, at the request of Paoli, 
and the French found it impossible to resist 
their united forces. Leaving nominal garri- 
sons at Bastia and Calvi, the Representatives 
re-embarked with their army for France, and 
Bonaparte was united to his fugitive family. 
His mother and her young children had land- 
ed at Nice, but afterv\ards moved to Mar- 
seilles, where thev were deprived of every 
resource, but full of courage and gocd 
health. Napoleon devoted the chief part of 
his income towards their supitort, and soon 
obtained a situation for Joseph in the Quar- 
termaster's department, while Lucien, at his 
brother's request, was sent to St Maximin, a 
small tovin in the vicinity, as keeper of mili- 
tary stores, and the children were placed at 
school. 

Though embarrassed by poverty, the exiles 
had mucli attention shown them at Marseilles, 
and associated with the first families. Mad- 
ame Clary, the widow of a merchant who 
had amassed a large fortune by trading with 
the \V'est Indies, was very kind to them, and 
sanctioned the betrothal of Joseph to lier 
daughter Julie. It has been stated that Na- 
poleon was attached to a younger sister, but 
that her father refused his consent to their mar- 
riage, saying that "one Bonaparte was enough 
in the san:e family." Hazlitt repeats this 
story, and alleges that it was to make the ob- 
ject of his early aflection a queen, that Napo 
leon consented to Bernadotte's succeeding to 
the throne of Sweden, and put the power 
into the hands of a capricious rival, who af- 
terwards deprived his benefactor of his crown. 
This is a romantic tale, but at St. Helena 
Napoleon denied ever having thought of mar- 
rying Mademoiselle Clary, and Joseph Bona- 
parte denies that the disdainful expression 
attributed to his father-in-law was ever used. 
" Monsieur Clary (wrote the Count Survil- 
liers) never could have uttered the ridiculous 
expression, for he died several years before 
my marriage, and I never knew hiin."t 



* Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 
t Letter to Major Lee. 



PROGRESS OF THE REVOLUTION. 



31 



Lucien, soon after the marringe of Joseph, 
espoused Christine, the daughter of Monsieur 
Boyer, who was his landlord at St. IMaxi- 
min. Although her early life had been passed 
in waiting on her father's guests, she is said 
to have been a woman of pleasing manners, 
and great goodness of heart. Lucien was 
devotetlly attached to her, and never would 
listen to propositions for a divorce in after 
life, preferring domestic happiness to a royal 
alliance. 

Marie Antoinette followed her husband to 
the scaffold, where hetacombs were daily 
sacrificed, by- order of rulers who rapidly 
succeeded each other — as in a temple in an- 
cient Rome, where the nuirderer of the of- 
ficiating priest became his successor. The 
struggle developed the abilities of many com- 
petent to govern; but after blazing in their 
orbits for awhile, they were invariably jolted 
from the political firmament by the envy 
which genius ever attracts, or fell beneath 
the axe which they iiad so unsparingly wield- 
ed, until the temple of French Libertj-, like 
that of Juggernaut, was known by the immo- 
lated victims with which the road leading to 
it was overlain. France is described as one 
vast conflagration of revolt and vengeance, 
lit up by emissaries from the capital, who 
mocked Humanity and outraged Patriotism. 
Peasant girls were beheaded for dancing with 
the enemies of the republic — mothers sufier- 
ed death because they lamented the fate of 
their sons — and the most refined cruelty was 
devised. As an example of this demoniacal 
sport, a writer cites the noyades at Nantes, 
where barges, crowded with victims, were 
anchored in deep water, and then scuttled. 
Young Royalists and their affianced brides 
were stripped naked, tied together, and then 
drowned — this was termed a " Republican 
Marriage." 

Napoleon's regiment was quartered at 
Nice, (where General Dugear was endeav- 
oring to organize an army for the invasion of 
Italy,) but he was chiefly at Bfarseilles and 
Avignon, negotiating with a body of insur- 
gents, who had seized the magazines of am- 
munition and munitions of war. In order to 
convince these malcontents that they were in 
the wrong, and that they could easily be 
forced into submission, the young ofticer pub- 
lished a political essay, entitled the " Supper 
of Beaucaire." A party was supposed to 
assemble at the supper-table of a hotel at 
Beaucaire, at the close of a fair, consisting of 
two merchants from Marseilles, a mechanic 
from Nismes, a gentleman from Montpelier, 
and an artillery officer, who is the writer. 
The conversation turning on the insurrection, 
the ftlarseiilais advocate opposition to the ar- 
my, and endeavor to show their city can re- 
sist it — ideas which the other civilians advo- 
cate. But the officer shows the superiority 
of veterans over raw recruits, and compels 
his opponents to admit that perseverance in 
their lawless project would result in failure, 
disgrace, and punishment. Citizens of an 
opulent city like Marseilles, he said, should 
support the authority of government. " Let 
poor countries fight to the last extremity. The 



native of Vivarais, of the Cervencs, of Cor- 
sica, may expose himself without fear to the 
event of battle. If he gain the figlit, he has 
attained his purpose. — if he loses, he is in no 
worse situation than before for making peace. 
But you, Marseillais — if yo^l lose a battle, 
the fruit of a thousand years of fatigue, of 
labor, of frugality, of good fortune, bercn e 
the prey of the soldier." 

Scott speaks derisively of this pamjdilet as 
a "small Jacobin publication," though he 
admits in a subsequent note that, having 
then for the first time seen a copy, " nothing 
can be more inaccurate " than his original 
account of it. It is but charitable to hope 
that many other "inaccurate"sta1ementsmay 
be attributed to lack of niatcrials, and the im- 
perfect library of French authors at Abbotts- 
ford. 

The English agents in the Mediterranean, 
well supplied with golden Louis, (coined in 
Birmingham,) spared no eflbrts to sow dis- 
sension in the French seaports, and to engage 
traitors to revolt. At Toulon they were suc- 
cessful. That fine naval station, with its 
forts, arsenals, magazines, and twenty-five 
ships-of-the-line, was surrendered by itsccm- 
nmnder to the combined fleets of France and 
Spain, under Admiral Lord Hood. Ihis was 
a severe blow to the Revolutionary govern- 
ment, who felt that the pride and safet)' of 
the nation required the in:niediate recapture 
of Toulon. Money and men — the sinews of 
war — were lavishly supplied, and a large 
force soon besieged the city. 'I he English, 
on their part, were not idle. Redoubts were 
erected on all the heights in the immediate 
vicinity, and furnished with the cannon taken 
from the lower decks of the captured French 
line-of-battle ships. The English fleet brought 
large reinforcements of Spanish, Sardinian, 
and Neapolitan troops, and Lirnt. General 
O'Hara, Governor of Gibraltar, came, 
with all his disposable force, to ccmmand 
this allied army of 44,000 men. This officer 
had commanded a regiment of Guards in the 
army under Lord Cornwallis, ^^hic■h served 
in the Southern States during the American 
Revolution. He distinguished hiiiiself at 
Guilford Court House, and other engage- 
ments, and was designated by his unlucky 
commander to head the British troops, when 
they marched out of their lines at Yorktown, 
to ground their arms befere the victorious 
Washington. It may naturalky be supposed 
that he wished t< revive his tarnished laurels 
by successfully defending Toulon. 

Bonaparte was at Paris when the Ccnven- 
ti(Ui was organizing its besieging army, and 
calling at the War Office to transact some 
business for General Brunet, he attracted the 
attention of the Minister. Referring to the 
files of the office, it was found that the young 
Corsican not only possessed high military 
abilities and personal merit, but that he had 
given many proofs of his devotion to the op- 
ponents of Royalty. He was at once prcnio 
ted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, and 
received orders to repair to the army before 
Toulon, and direct the besieging artillery. 

On his arrival at head-quarters, on the 



32 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



12lh of September, the young Coloner wait- 
ed oil General Cartaux, a Parisian house- 
puiiiter, who had been raised from the adju- 
tancy of a militia battalion to the rank of Major 
General in one cViy- He was a tall, haughty 
man, with the ignorance incidental to his 
rapid career, and covered from head to foot 
with gold lace and embroidery. Glancing 
contemptuously at the diminutive form and 
plain apparel of Boiiaparfc, after he had 
read his credentials, the braggadocio twisted 
his moustache and said, with an air of dis- 
dain : " This was quite unnecessary, fori 
need no assistance to capture Toulon. [low- 
ever, you are welcome, and you may share 
the glory of burning the town tomorrow, 
without having experienced any of the fa- 
tigue. Stay and take supper with me." 

The next morning Bonaparte found that 
the artillery department displa3'ed the igno- 
rance of its directors, and ap])ealed to the 
agents of the Convention, who were so con- 
vinced by his reasoning that they gave him 
the uncontrolled ccmmand. His knowledge, 
activity, and energy, were soon manifest, and 
in less than six weeks he had organized his 
men, appointed reliable oflicers, erected bat- 
teries, and brought tv\o hundred guns to bear 
upon the enemy. He slept in his cloak every 
night by the side of his guns, was foremost 
in repelling sallies, and invigorated his men 
by his enthusiasm. One day he seized the 
rammer of an artilleryman who had been 
killed, and charged the gun repeatedly. Un- 
fortunately the dead man had been afilicted 
with a cutaneous complaint, which Bonaparte 
contracted, and from the effects of which he 
did not entirely recover for years. 

On another occasion, so many men were 
shot at an exposed battery, that tlie gunners 
refused to serve the pieces. Bonaparte 
neither punislied nor reproached his men, but, 
resorting to that magic by which genius sub- 
jects to its authority the impulses of mankind, 
directed his orderly to post a sign over the 
deserted guns, on which was inscribed : 
" The battery of men without fear." The 
appeal flew electrically through the ranks, 
and the artillerymen now contended for the 



battery, was captured by a battalion of 
infantry headed by Bonaparte. Severely 
wounded, the disappointed Briton refused his 
captor's personal offer of civility. "All I ask 
is to be left alone, and to owe nothing to 
pity," was ihe surly, yet dignified reply of 
the only ofKcer who had to surrender to 
Washington and to Napoleon. 

Bonaparte himself was wounded in the 
thigh by a bayonet, and among the defeated 
British was Col. Hudson Lowe, afterwards 
infamously known as the jailer of St. Helena. 

At length the young Colonel of Artillery 
gained his desired positions — two promonto- 
ries which conmianded the outer and inner 
roadsteads, and thus menaced the fleet. He 
had seen that when these positions were 
gained, Toulon would not be tenable, and 
no sooner did he open his fire from them, 
than Lord Hood and his officers took meas- 
ures as well for the embarkation of the troops, 
as for pillaging and burning the French ships 
and magazines. It was a fearful night, the 
blaze resembling the eruption of a volcano, 
and the explosion of the magazines adding to 
the horrors of the scene. At daybreak, the 
hostile squadron was seen under weigh in the 
distance, "freighted with plunder, ignominy 
and grief." 

General Dugommier, who had succeeded 
Cartaux, and who was a brave old soldier, 
was convinced that he owed the victory to 
Bonaparte. He not only placed his name at 
the head of a list of officers Vvhom he recom- 
mended for promotion, but he added in a 
note that "his merits and talents were so 
great, that if the Committee of Public Safety 
neglected him, he would advance himself." 

Promoted to the rank of General by brevet 
Bonaparte was ordered to make a military 
survey of the southwestern coast of France, 
and to superintend the erection of proper 
fortifications. This task he performed in a 
manner which gave striking evidence of the 
analytical power of his understanding, and 
his contempt of the local magistrates, whose 
officious self-conceit led them to demand ex- 
pensive batteries to protect each insignificant 
hamlet. Bonaparte, having finished his sur- 



honor of serving the deserted guns. To con-' veys, divided the "positions" on the coast in- 
firm their spirit. Colonel Bonaparte took his to three classes, of which the large naval har- 
station on ihis battery, and ordered the "men j bors were the first, the commercial posts the 
without fear" to open their fire. Thus out ofi second, and the inlets where invaders might 
discouragement he created heroism.* , laud the third — and he prescribed for each 

The siege lingered for months, and not a j class, fortifications adapted to its importance 
week passed in which Bonaparte did not give I and exposure. By njinute calculations, he 
some additional proof of his talents and hero- assigned to each battery ordnance of a proper 



ism. He was often hampered however, by ■ 
the civil and military officers who held supe- 
rior rank, but who were too ignorant to com- 
prehend his well jjlanned schemes. Barras, 
one of the national commissioners, asked him 
one day, in the midst of an engagement, to ! 
have a gun pointed in another direction. I 



calibre, and even laid down the angle of ele- 
vation at which each gun was to be fired, 
should the enemy approach. His observa 
tions on coast defences, w hich he afterwards 
dictated to Gen. Gourgaud at St. Helena, 
are master-pieces of military knowledge. 
In February, 1794, Bonaparte was cora- 



No sir ! " was the reply, " I will do my missioned as Brigadier-General, and ordered 



duty according to my judgment, and be an- 
swerable for the consequences with my 
head." I 

General O'Hara, sallying out to capture a 



Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 



to join the army of Italy, then stationed at 
Nice— Muirou and Junot accompanying him 
as Aides-de-camp. The conmiander. Gen- 
eral Dumerbion, a veteran soldier, having 
heard of the hero of Toulon, immediately de- 
tailed Bonaparte to reconnoitre the enemy's 



ARREST FOR TREASON. 



33 



line, and endeavor to devise a plan for 
crossing the Alps into Italy. In ten days, a 
memorial was prepared, proposing a simple, 
yet novel scheme, by which a small fraction 
of the army could hold tiie enemy in check 
on the mountains, while the main body 
could force a passage where the last of the 
Alpine rar^ge melts into the first of the Appe- 
nine. 

Robespierre the younger and Ricord, Rep- 
resentative delegates, approving this plan, it 
was immediately carried into execution. — 
General Masseha, at the head of 14,000 men, 
penetrated into his native mountain defiles, 
and held the enemy at bay; while General 
Bonaparte, at the head of the second 
division, advanced eighty miles along the sea- 
coast, driving the Sardinians before him. — 
By this well concerted scheme, the French 
army (which for two years had vainly en- 
deavored to advance,) surmounted the frown- 
ing barrier of the Alps, drove back the 
Austrian and Sardinian troops, captured six- 
ty pieces of cannon, with large supplies of 
ammunition and provisions, and cut oft' the 
enemy's communication with the English 
cruisers. General Dumerbion, in announcing 
this triumph to tie Convention, said: "It 
was to the skilful dispositions of the General 
of Artillery that he in a great measure owed 
the success of the expedition." 

Tlie victorious cainpaigii ended, Bonaparte 
was sent by Robespierre the younger, on a 
secret mission to Genoa, wilh orders to ex- 
amine the fortifications, and ascertain, if 
possible, the political intentions of the Geno- 
ese. During his absence, both the tyrant 
Robespierre and his younger brother were 
guillotined, and upon Bonaparte's return, he 
was arrested by an order from Paris, charg- 
ing him with treason. It was alleged that he 
was a mercenary accomplice of Robespierre 
and Ricord, in a scheme to betray the French 
army into the hands of the Austrians. He 
was imprisoned, and his papers were sent 
to Paris. 

In a fortnight, a counter-order appeared, 
restoring the prisoner to liberty and to his 
rank. The officer who came to release him 
from arrest found him busily engaged in his 
dungeon, poring over the map of Lom hardy 
— his subsequent actions evinced that he hud 
not wasted liis time even in this embarrass- 
ment, as it will be seen that he made ample use 
of the geographical information he had thus 
unpleasingly gleaned. His habits of early 
rising were so strongly implanted, as not to 
be overcome by any difficulty. During his 
confinement a friend had occasion to visit 
him long before day-break — not entertaining 
a doubt but that he was still in bed, he 
knocked at the door; on opening which he 
was surprised to find him dressed, and seat- 
ed at the table with plans, maps, and books 
spread before him. "What," exclaimed 
his visitor, " not yet in bed ?" " In bed !" 
reiterated Bonaparte, " do not mistake me, 
I have already risen." "Indeed, what so 
early ?" inrpiired his acquaintance. " Yes, 
so early, if you will have it so; I consider 
two or three hours quite long enough for any 



man to sleep, I never indulge in more," was 
the reply of Bonaparte. This would appear 
to have been his uniform custom, not only to 
which he adhered to the end of his life, but 
one from which he very frequently derived 
the greatest advantage over his opponents. 

The winter of 1794-95 Bonaparte em- 
ployed in completing the fortifications of Vado 
andOneille; in inspecting the line of mari- 
time forts from the Var to the Rhone, which 
were in the progress of construction under 
his superintendence; and in perfecting his 
acquaintance with that part of the grand 
chain of the maritime Alps, in which he had 
been personally employed. So intent were 
his observations that, in company with Gen- 
eral St. Hilaire, he passed a night in Janu- 
ary on the top of a mountain near the Col de 
Tende; whence, at sunrise, in the gorgeous 
light of the eastern horizon, he descried the 
lovely plains of Italy, and the distant waters 
of the Po. So strong was his emotion that 
he was tempted to exclaim, " Haliaml 
Italiam !" his ardent genius prophetic of 
future glories, and dazzled by the visions 
which itself inspired. 

, But his time was not altogether engrossed 
by the toils of war or the rude grandeur of 
mountain prospects. Scenes less inclement, 
and softer contests occasionally engaged him. 
Among the members of the convention in at- 
tendance on the army of Italy, was M. 
Thurreau, a gentleman whose personal in- 
significance in the deputation was redeemed 
by the wit and beauty of his wife. This 
lad}' was not insensible to the merit, nor un- 
kind to the devotion of the young general of 
artillery, who, proud of his success, ventured 
to manifest his adoration, by ordering for her 
amusement, as they walked out on the great 
theatre of the Alps, an attack of the advanced 
posts stationed below them. The French were 
victorious, but Bonaparte never forgave him- 
self for thus wantonly sacrificing human life, 
and at St. Helena the remembrance of his 
amorous infatuation was accompanied with 
regret.* 

This attachment for Madame Thurreau, 
(which was unnoticed by Norvins, Hazlitt, 
Scott and Lockhart,) 3Iajor Lee ascribes as 
the reason which prevented Bonaparte's ac- 
ceptance of an invitation from Robespierre 
the younger to accompany him to Paris — 
had the general accepted, he would have un- 
doubtedly been beheaded on the 9th Ther- 
midor. 

Years had revolved — the general of artil- 
lery filled the imperial throne, whilst the fair 
one whose attractions had pleased and pre- 
served him was become a poor and faded 
widow. After many petitions which failed 
to pass the barrier of indifTerence that envi- 
rons power, Madame Thurreau obtained, by 
accident, an interview with the Emperor. — 
" Why," said the sovereign kindly, "have 
you not before made known your situation; 
many of our former acquaintances at Nice 
are now personages of the court, and in con- 
stant intercourse with me." The answer of 



Memorial from St. Helene. — Las Cases. 



34 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



the widow is yet another proof that friend- 
ship is fMithful only to prosperity. "Alas, 
sire, since my misfortunes, they have ceased 
to know me." He felt for her distress, and, 
if he remembered her former weakness, he 
felt also that he was certainly not the proper 
person to chastise it. Her wants \«'ere in- 
stantly relieved, and her future comfort liber- 
ally provided for.* 

In March, 1795, the "army of Italy " 
was incorporated with the " army of the 
Alps," and the companies of Gen. Bona- 
parte's brigade were annexed to other com- 
mands, in obedience to a general order 
reducing the number of field otlicers. Bona- 
parte at once set out for Paris, with a view 
of applying for other and suitable employ- 
ment. On his route he visited his mother at 
Marseilles, to whose heart his safety from 
danger, and his rising fame, must have com- 
municated the tenderest pleasure. He found, 
too, his brother Joseph happily iviarried, and 
the comforts of the family, which had been 
seriously impaired by tiie cruelty of Paoli, in 
a great measure renovated by his mother's 
prudence. At Marseilles he met General 
Kellermann, on his way to assume the cont- 
mand of the combined forces, and communi- 
cated to him much information respecting the 
theatre of war, on which the hero of Val- 
my was not destined to gain laurels. — 
Then adopting his brother Louis, whose edu- 
cation he had particularly superintended, as 
an extra aide-de-camp, he proceeded on his 
way to Paris. At Chatillon-sur-Seine, he 
met intelligence of the insurrection of the 1st 
of Prairial, in which the Jacobins were, 
after temporary and terrible success, again 
overcome. The father of his aide-de-camp, 
Marmont, resided at Chatillon ; and to grati- 
fy this officer, at whose instance he had taken 
Chatillon in his route, as well as to wait the 
return of public order in the capital, having 
been sufficiently disgusted with popular tu- 
mults, he remained there several days. The 
father of INIarmont, a knight of St. Louis, 
was a rich proprietor of iron works in Bur- 
gundy. His son, who felt a strong inclina- 
tion for a military life, after failing to obtain 
entrance into the Royal Artillery, had been 
contented to join a provincial regiment. He 
was recommended to the friendship and pro- 
tection of Bonaparte by an uncle who was a 
schoolfellow of the latter at Brienne, and his 
comrade and friend in the regiment of La 
Fere. A royalist, this uncle forsook his 
country to follow the emigrant princes, and 
bespoke of Bonaparte that care of his 
nephew, which he himself could no longer 
bestow on him. It is needless to say that 
this confidence of the exile was not misplaced. 
Marmont's Hither, though avaricious, was 
profuse and extravagant in entertaining the 
hero of Toulon and Saorgio, and the liberal 
patron of his son. Though the weather was 
warm, his hearths blazed with fires, so that 
his hospitality amused more than it comforted 
his guest. t 



Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 
Life of Napoleon.— iee. 



Ihe date of Bonaparte's arrival in Paris 
has been variously stated by Scott, Hazlitt, 
Norvins, Lockhart and Bourrienne. The 
two last named authors not only place him in 
Paris before the first Prairial, but indirectly 
implicate him in the defeated conspiracy of 
that day. Yet Napoleon himself very dis- 
tinctly states that he arrived at the metropolis 
subsequent to the insurrection.! He occu- 
pied a small suite of rooms, and lived a re- 
tired life, although there is not the least 
evidence that he was destitute, as some 
writers have averred. 

The Minister of War, to whom Bona- 
parte applied for employment, was an ex- 
captain of the royal artillery, nqmed Aubry, , 
who had little sympathy for those who had 
been brought forward by the revolution. — 
Accordingly, when, in applying for a com- 
mand, Bonaparte represented lliat he had 
commanded the artillery at the siege of Tou- 
lon; had superintended the work of fortify- - 
ing the coast and harbors of Provence; hadl 
ever since commanded the artillery of the ' 
army of Italy; and added that it would be; 
extremely painful for him to leave a corps s 
in which he had served from his very in-- 
fancy; Aubry coldly observed that there J 
were a great many artillery generals, that; 
Bonaparte was the youngest of the number,, 
and could not be employed out of turn. Ass 
Aubry had not been on duty during the vv'ar,^ 
and nevertheless had the eftVontery to pro-- 
mote himself, from a retired captaincy, too 
the rank of general of division and inspectori 
of artillery, tliis observation was received] 
and retorted as unjust and impertinent. — \ 
" Officers soon grow old on the field of bat-^ 
tie," was the mixture of irony and logic, i 
with which Bonaparte abashed and irritated! 
the inexperienced veteran. A few days af-' 
tervvards, more in punishment than reward,! 
lie was ordered to join the army of the west,, 
engaged in the Vendean war, and take comi| 
mand of a brigade of Infantry. The servicet 
was unpleasant to his feelings, the destina- 
tion an outrage to his pride, and actuated by 
a proper feeling of dignity, he sent in his 
resignation. This was not accepted, nor was 
it at once refused. % 

Kellermann, meanwhile, had been defeated' 
several times, and it was feared that he- 
would be forced to evacuate the Genoese 
territory. The Committee of Public Safetj 
became alarmed, and called together tht 
different representatives who had been de- 
puted to the army of Italy, in order to consul 
them. Pontecoulant, who succeeded x\ubr) 
in the vv^ar department, was one anion" 
others who pointed out Napoleon as eminent-i 
ly qualified to give an opinion on tlie subject 
— a piece of service for which Bonapart< 
showed his gratitude by promoting the minis 
ter to a seat in the Senate when he after 
wards became consul. Napoleon was sum^ 
moned to the topographical committee, anc 
laid down the line of the Borghetto for thi 
troops — a suggestion that saved the Trend 



* Life of Napoleon. — Lre. 

t Conversalions at al. Helena. — 3Iontlwlon. 



POLITICAL CHANGE. 



35 



army and preserved the coast of Genoa, not- 
withstanding the repeated attacks of the ene 
my. At the end of the year (1795) 
General Sciierer superseded Kellerniann in 
the command; and on the 20th of Noveniher, 
having received reinforcements from the 
army of tlie Pyrenees, attacUeJ the Piedmon- 
tese general Devins at Loano, drove him 
from ail his positions, and had he heen suf- 
ficiently enterprising, might have conquered 
all Italy; but instead of pursuing his advan- 
tages, he returned to Nice, and went into 
winter quarters. The enemy did the same.§ 
It was while thus temporarily employed by 
the Topographical Committee, forming plans 
for others to carry out with honor, that Bona- 
parte thought of entering the Turkish service. 
His ambition, cramped at home, and kept 
from the heroic fields of Italy, turned to- 
wards the Orient, and he presented to the 
Conniiiltee of the Convention a memorial, in 
which he offered to undertake a mission to 
Constantinople, for the purpose of remodel- 
ing the artillery of the Sultan, and thus ren- 
dering the Porte more formidable to the ex- 
panding ambition of Russia. This, he con- 
tended, would, by assisting to preserve the 
balance of European power, render good ser- 
vice to the French Republic. The East at 
this period seemed to open a wide field of 
glory and of power. Visions of empire al- 
ready floated before his young imagination. 
" How strange it would be," he is reported 
to have said to a friend, with whom he was 
on terms of intimacy, " if a little Corsican 
officer were to beconse king of .Jerusalem !" 
His application, however, was never answer- 
ed; and the name and achievements of Bona- 
parte remain the property of France. '• If a 
Coinmissioner-at-war," remarks de Bour- 
rienne, " had written ^ granted' upon his 
note, that little word might have changed the 
face of Europe." 

Bonaparte was noted for his punctual ar- 
rival at the bureau where he was employed, 
and for his diligent attention to business. In 
the evening he used to frequent the theatres, 
and, at a later hour, go with his friend Tal- 
ma into private circles, where they were wel- 
come guests. The tragedian, of course, was 
the " lion," but all listened with interest and 
respect to the brilliant remarks of "little 
Bonaparte." 

And about this time, Bonaj)arte's lo\e of 
Democracy began to waver. He could see 
that the slaves of Bourbon despotism, having 
tasted of the spirit of freedom, had drained 
the e.xhilerating draught to the very dregs. 
Intoxication had followed, and by the draught, 
to borrow allegory in illustration, the angel of 
liberty had been transformed into a demon. 
Reason and philosophy, tbat first awakened 
the sleeping energies of the people, had dis- 
covered — alas! too late — that the unregu- 
lated desires of a race of men freed from 
moral obedience and rciligious obligation pro- 
duced anarchy instead of reducing society 
into form and unity. The excesses of the 
worst vices were the inevitable results of the 



§ Life of Napoleon.— /faj/jY<. 



abused principles of truth, and the chief 
magistracy was like a temple in ancient 
Rome, where, by murdering the priest, one 
could succeed him. 

Bonaparte saw, also, that whilst France 
boasted of her freedom from tyranny, her 
own counsels were torn to pieces by little 
knots of tyrants, who violated all rights, and 
undermined the pillars of her freedom. En- 
thusiasm carried to madness^ — confidence, 
the result of ardent resolution — talents the 
most extraordinary — and principles the most 
base — wielded her energies, and directed 
her powers. But the ambitious young Gen- 
eral felt that the good sword by his side was 
more powerful than democracy or legitimacy, 
than republican or monarchial ])rinciples. — 
France could only be ruled by the sword ! 

Nor is this surprising, when it is considered 
how firmly the War Spirit had taken root in 
the land of the ancient Gauls. During the 
first three-quarters of the eighteenth century, 
her arniies were forty-six years absent on 
hostile expeditions, and when the hour of 
reckoning came, the impoverished people took 
sanguinary revenge. Years of warfare had 
engendered a frightful indifference to the Di- 
vine command, " thou shalt not kill," and 
so lowered the standard of morality, that the 
social bond was easily broken, giving full 
sway to individual passions. The struggle 
developed the abilities of many competent to 
govern, but after blazing in their orbits for a 
while, they were invariably jolted from the 
political firmament, by the envy which genius 
ever attracts, or fell beneath the axe they had 
so unsparingly wielded. " La icrreur rcg- 
nait dans Paris,'" is the impressive remark 
of M. Thiers, and terrible it must have been 
to see fiction succeeding faction, each party 
marching over the headless corpses of its 
predecessors, towards " Liberty, whose tem- 
ple, like that of Juggernaut, waste be known 
hy the immolated victims with which its road 
was overlain." The Constituents were 
crushed by the Girondists, the Girondists by 
the Dantonists, the Dantonists by the Ther- 
midorians, and in each party, the military 
chieftains sought to occupy the place of the 
extinct aristocracy, lording it over the rest. 
Titles of nobility were passports to the scaf- 
fold, and the sans culottes denounced well- 
dressed men as aristocrats, yet never were 
oflicers more imperiously rigid in requiring 
the " honors due their rank," or more gaudi- 
ly clad, than the " citoye}is generaux.^' 

This was not unobserved by Bonaparte, 
who resolved to substitute his arbitrary will, 
backed by bayonets, for the despotism of the 
many. Already his ambition had seen the 
throne of France in the horizon, and now his 
star began to rise steadily and proudly, as if 
by an irresistible influence, above the desti- 
nies of his contemporaries.* 

The Convention, fully aware of its preca- 
rious existence, sought to remodel the Gov- 
ernment by adopting a more conservative 
Constitution. The executive power of this 



* France: Social, Literary, Political.— 5!'r i/. Z,. 
Bulwer. 



36 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: 



new system of government was to be held by 
a directory of five members — the judicinl 
power in a body of elective magistrates, 
whose sentence, in criminal cases, were to 
be founded on the verdict of juries — and the 
legislative power, in two houses, the upper, 
or council of ancients, consisting of two hun- 
dred and fifty members, and the lower, con- 
sisting of twice that number, and called the 
council of five hundred. The legislative 
bodies were to appoint the members of the 
directory, and to reappoint one out of the five 
every year, and were themselves to be chosen 
by electors delegated for that purpose by the 
people in their primary assemblies. One- 
third of each council was to be triennially re- 
newed by the popular will, and the entire 
directory quinquennially, by the will of the 
legislature. 

Unfortunately for the Convention, it added 
two supplementary decrees, which evinced 
the determination of its members to retain 
control of the government. They were : 
" First. IMiat the electoral bodies, in choos- 
ing representatives to the two new councils, 
must elect, at least, two-thirds of the then 
members of the Convention. Second. That 
if full two-thirds of the then members of the 
Convention were not returned by the electors, 
then the Convention sho^jld possess the right 
to supply the number that might be deficient 
out of their own body." 

These decrees proved to the Parisians that 
they had merely changed masters, instead of 
gaining their Independence, and they deter- 
mined to offer resistance — the members of the 
Convention were equally zealous in preparing 
to enforce their edicts. The troops of the line 
had always held the National Guards m jeal- 
ous contempt, and looked upon them as 
mushroom soldiers, who were not in a condi- 
tion to stand up against veterans, who' had 
passed their lives either in camps or upon ac- 
tive service. This feeling was well under- 
stood by the mendiers of the Convention, who 
turned it to account, caused it to be carefully 
fostered !)y their emissaries, who were inde- 
fatigable in their endeavors to widen the 
breach. Of the latter description of force, 
there were in and near Paris upwards of five 
thousand men, well officered ; upon these, 
therefi)re, the Convention concluded, and con- 
cluded justly, reliance might safely be placed; 
added to this, there were several hundred ar- 
tillery-men who were also disposed to assist 
their views : over and above which, the Con- 
vention, to make " assurance doublv sure," 
organized a body designated by the sounding 
title of *' The Sacred Band," which compri- 
sed some fifteen hundred of the most san- 
guinary desperate rutfians to be found among 
the offscourings of the metropolis, most of 
whom had been the vile instruments of Robes- 
pierre, men without a particle of principle, 
who were ready for any enterprise, provided 
they were but paid for their treachery. Ty- 
rants are indispensably necessitated to league 
themselves with the most worthless of man- 
kind : it is the penalty irrevocably imposed 
them as the price of their unhallowed meas- 
ures. With Such auxiliaries, the Convention 



bid defiance to their opponents, arranged the 
tactics to be adopted, and nothing inore re- 
mained to be done on their part, but to seek 
out a general to whose skill they could con- 
fide the command, to whose discretion they 
could safely commit the execution of a plan, 
upon the success of which their very exist- 
ence, not only as legislators, but as men, de- 
pended, seeing that defeat would most assur- 
edly have introduced them to the tender mer- 
cies of the guillotine. Fortunately for Bona- 
parte, General Menou, an officer not very well 
calculated for such an undertaking, was the 
individual selected, and representatives were 
appointed to attend and watch his motions.* 

A club formed from the radical citizens of 
the Lepelletier ward of Pans, was particu- 
larly violent, and at last declared itself in 
open rebellion to the government. Six other 
clubs, (or " sections " as they were called,) 
hastened to arms — the tocsin was sounded, 
and the city was soon in a state of insurrec-- 
tion. Gen. Menou was ordered to restore or- - 
der, and marched against the insurgents on i 
the evening of the 12th Vendemiare, (3d oft 
October, 1795.) He headed a strong force,, 
with a detachment of dragoons and two field I 
pieces, but hesitated to attack a convent! 
which the " Sectionaires " had fortified, and| 
finally retreated. | 

Fond of dramatic entertainments. Bona--! 
parte was that evening at a theatre near thed 
scene of action, and witnessed Menou's re-^, 
pulse. He then repaired to the Convention,; 
where he found dismay painted on every,; 
countenance. The Commissioners of War, , 
in order to exculpate themselves, accused 
Menou of treason, and his arrest was or- 
dered. It was then unanimously agreed 
that the public safety demanded the immedi- 
ate appointment of some one with greater 
nerve and military skill to command thei 
troops. Several members had ascended thei 
tribune, each to recommend his own favorite^ 
general. It was then that, supported by thai 
Representatives who had been with the ar- 
my at Toulon and at Nice, and by others 
who had become acquainted with the 
amazing resources of his genius as a member 
of the 'J'opographicai Committee, Barras pro- 
posed Napoleon, as an officer whose abilities, 
promptitude, energy of character, and gen- 
eral moderation, best qualified him for tho 
emergency. The nomination being approved 
by Mariette, the leader of the RIoderates, 
and chief of the Council of Forty, was con- 
firmed by the Assembly, and messengers 
were despatched into the city in search oi 
the General elect. Bonaparte, who had' 
heard all that passed, deliberated for a while 
what course he should pursue. His reflec- 
tions have been recorded by himself. Ever 
success, he reasoned, would be attendee 
with a degree of odium: while failure would, 
in a few hours, add his name to the list c 
revolutionary tyrants, and devote it to lh( 
eternal execration of future generations. Or 
the other hand, the defeat of the Conventior 
would destroy the possibility of a beneficia ' 



Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. — Hodson- 



THE 12TH VENDEMAIRE. 



37 



result fioin so much toil and blootlsiied as the 
Revolution had already cost. The national 
enemy, so often vanquished, would again be- 
come triumphant, would load France with 
insult and ignominy, would indulge the ty- 
ranny of revenge, and rule her by force. — 
These considerations, assisted by the enthusi- 
asm of youth, and his confidence in his own 
powers, decided him. lie went to the Com- 
mittee, and after stating that he had wit- 
nessed the proceedings in the Rue Vivienne, 
and that the failure there was chiefly attribut- 
utable to the interference of the Conniiission- 
ers, expressed his readiness to accept the 
proffered command, provided he was left 
free to act upon his own responsibility. To 
have dispensed with the presence of the 
Representatives, however, would have been, 
at that time, a breach of the law; the matter 
was therefore compromised by the Com- 
mittee, whidi named Barras as General-in- 
cliief, but vested the actual command in Na- 
poleon.* 

Bonaparte immediately laid his plans of 
action, and first sent ftlurat, then a major ol' 
cavalry, to Sablons, with orders to bring the 
forty pieces of artillery there to Paris. The 
intrepid IMurat performed his duty before 
sunrise, and Bonaparte had the guns so plant- 
ed around the Tuileries palace, where the 
Convention was in session, as to be able to 
repel attack. Ammunition and provisions 
were collected, a line of retreat to the coun- 
try was kept open, and the cannoniers, with 
lighted matches, stood by their grape-charged 
guns. Battalions of well-armed troops occu- 
pied the Place du Carrousel, as also the gar- 
dens of the Tuileries, in which Bonaparte 
himself cooly awaited the attack of the sec- 
tionaries, under the guidance of Danican, 
their general, whose conduct contributed to 
their defeat, by suffering himself to be 
amused with messages from the Convention, 
while they completed their arrangements, 
and strengthened the various positions of the 
Liberticide army. 

Late m the afternoon, the Insurgent force 
began to move against the Tuileries from 
different directions. When they arrived 
within musket-shot of Bonaparte's posts they 
were summoned to disperse in the name of 
the law — their advanced divisions answered 
by firing their muskets, and then Bonaparte's 
cannoneers opened upon their dense masses a 
destructive fire of grape-shot, which carried 
confusion into their ranks, and after a des- 
perate effort at charging their guns, the col- 
unms dispersed themselves. The cavalry 
and infantry of the Convention pursued them, 
iand after some resistance upon one or two 
Other points, the streets were cleared of the 
Section men, most of whom gave up their 
arms during the night. In less than two 
hours, the insurgents were defeated in all 
their attacks, and their cannon sent from St. 
Grerniain being intercepted, they lost all hope. 
Bonaparte, in taking in his turn the offensive, 
A'ith a sentiment like that of Cfcsar at Phar- 
ialia, ordered blank cartridges only to be 



■ Life of Napoleon — George Moir Bussey. 



fired, justly inferring that, when sucli crowds, 
after the indulgence of confidence and a des- 
perate exertion of courage, were once put to 
flight, the .sound of a gun would keep U]) their 
j)aiiic. 'Ihis forbearance saved many lives. 
During the night, he cleared the streets 
of barricades, patroled the streets, dis- 
lodged a party from the church of St. 
St. Roche, and surrounded with detach- 
ments of infantry and artillery another 
party in the Palais Royal. The next day it 
was easily dispersed, us was a body who 
had collected in the convent at the head of 
the rue Vivienne. By noon on the 5th of 
October, the insurrection was suppressed, 
and tranquility perfectly restored. 'Die 
killed and wounded, of which rather the 
smaller number belonged to the troops of the 
convention, amounted to between four and 
five hundred. Bonaparte had a horse shot 
under him. 

'J his victory, which caused infinite satis- 
faction to the real friends of the republic, 
who saw in it the defeat of Bourbon hopes, 
foreign intrigues, and domestic treason, re- 
newed and augmented the authority of the 
convention, very seasonably for the eslabiish- 
ment of the new constitution. Ihe members 
of that assembly were sensible of its value, 
as well in regard to the imminence of danger 
from which it rescued themselves, as to the 
series of convulsions from which it saved 
their country. In a report from the connnit- 
tee of public safety, which was adopted by 
the Convention in the sitting of the 5th, it is 
described as, " a victory gained over a coali- 
tion of royalism and anarchy, the most 
glorious of the revolution, and also the most 
fortunate, as it was likely to close that 
great struggle." * 

Bonaparte was soon appointed Command- 
er-in Chief of the home forces, and reorgan- 
ized the regular and citizen troops of the 
capital with great skill, securing the esteem 
of all. Refractory companies of the National 
Guard were disbanded — armed political clubs 
were broken up — and the efforts of intriguing 
agents of the Bourbons, well supplied with 
English gold, were promptly frustrated. Fam- 
ine, too, appeared to aid in exciting the popu- 
lace to outbreaks, and the young General was 
often obliged to call out his troops to suppress 
riots. On one occasion, when hastening with 
his staff to disperse a mob, he was surround- 
ed by a crowd offish-women, menacingly de- 
manded bread, and became so clamorous, that 
his situation was rather critical: his presence 
of mind, however, did not desert him, but 
shone forth conspicuously. He had nearly 
persuaded them to disperse, when a sturdy 
robust fish-wife, having somewhat of the Fal- 
staff appearance, was most vehement in her 
exhortations to those assembled to keep their 
places, exclaiming, with shrill tones and vio- 
lent gesticulation, pointing to the ofhcers, — 
" These coxcombs, with their fine epaulettes 
and gorgets, only laugh at our distress; pro- 
vided they can feed well and fatten, they care 
not if the poor people die of hunger." Na- 



Life of Napoleon — Lee. 



NAPOLEON 



BONAPARTE: 

-^ 



poleon, who was then perhaps the lennest of 
his race, with imperturable nonchalance, turn- 
ed to her with great good-huuior, saying, — 
" My good woman ! praj' look at me : which 
do you thinii is the fattest, you or I ? You 
may easily perceive that, compared with 
yourself, I am but a slip of parchment." — 
The naivete of this address, so congenial with 
Parisian feelings, caused a general burst of 
laughter, the fury of the populace was dis- 
armed, they separated enjoying the joke, 
while the general continued his round without 
further annoyance.* 

Tranquility was now restored, and the gay 
Parisians, elated by the joy of their deliver- 
ance, gave themselves up to pleasures and 
refinements. Art, taste, luxury, revived. — 
Female beauty regained its empire — an em- 
pire strengthened by the remembrance of all 
the tender and all the sublime virtues which 
women, delicately bred and reputed frivolous, 
had displayed during the evil days. Refined 
manners, chivalrous sentiments, followed in 
the train of love. The dawn of the Arctic 
summer day after the Arctic winter niglit, the 
great unsealing of the waters, the awakening 
of animal and vegetable life, the sudden soft- 
ening of the air, the sudden blooming of the 
flowers, the sudden bursting of whole forests 
into verdure, is but a feeble type of that hap- 
piest and most genial of revoiutions — the 
revolution of the ninth of Thermidor.f 

Prominent among the beauties who graced 
the gay resorts of the metropolis, and were 
the acknowledged queens of fashion m the 
republican Arcadia, was IMadame Josephine 
de Beauharnais. Born at St. Pierre, in Mar- 
tinique, on the 23d of June, 1763, Madame 
de Beauharnais was educated by her father, 
a respectable planter, and at an early age 
reigned in the hearts of all who knew her. — 
Terpsychore was her favorite goddess, and 
one who witnessed her dancing describes her 
light form, rising scarcely above the middle 
size, as seeming in its faultless synnnetry to 
float rather than to move — the verv persona- 
tion of Grace. She exercised her pencil, and 
her needle and embroidering frame, with 
beautiful address. A love of flowers, that 
truly feminine aspiration, and, (according to 
a master of elegance,) infallible index of a 
purity of heart, was with her no uninstructed 
admiration. She had early cultivated a know- 
ledge of botany, and in after years introduced 
into Europe one of the most beautiful of vege- 
table productions — the Camelia. In all to 
which the empire of woman's taste rightly 
extends, hers was exquisitely just, and simple 
as it was refined. Her sense of the becoming 
and the proper in all things, and under every 
variety of circumstances, appeared native and 
intuitive. She read delightfully; and nature 
had been here peculiarly propitious; for so 
harmonious were the tones of her voice, even 
in the most ordinary conversation, that in- 
stances are common of those who, coming 
unexpectedly, and unseen, within their influ- 
ence, have remained as if suddenly fascinated 



* Life of Napoleon. — Hodgson. 
t Edinburg Quarterly Review. 



and spell-bound, till the sounds ceased, or 
fears of discovery forced the listener away. 
Like the harp of David on the troubled breast 
of Israel's King, this charm is known to have 
wrought powerfully upon Napoleon. His own 
admission was, "The first applause of the 
French people sounded to my ear sweet as the 
voice of Josephine." 

During the period of her youth, a strange 
prediction, made by a negro woman, obtained 
such an influence over her imagination, as to 
color the whole of her subsequent life, and 
we will give it in her own words, as she sub- 
sequently related it to the liidies of her court : 
" One day, some time before my first mar- 
riage, while taking my usual walk, I observed 
a number of negro girls assembled round an 
old woman, engjiged in telling their fortunes. 
I drew near to observe their proceedings. The 
old sibyl, on beholding me, uttered a loud ex- 
clamation, and almost by force seized my 
hand. She appeared to be under the greatest 
agitation. Amused at these absurdities, as I 
thought them, I allowed her to proceed, say- 
ing, ' So you discover something extraordi- 
nary in my destiny.'' — 'Yes.' 'Is happi- 
ness or misfortune to be my lot? '■ — ' Misfor- 
tune. Ah, stop ! — and happiness, too.' 'You 
take care not to commit yourself, my good 
dame; j'o«r oracles are not the most intelli- 
gible.' — 'I am not permitted to render them 
more clear,' said the woman, raising her eyes 
with a mysterious expression towards heaven. 
' But to the point,' replied I, for my curiosity 
began to be excited; 'what read you con- 
cerning me in futurity ? ' — ' What do I see in 
the future .' You will not believe Hie if I 
speak .' ' ' Yes, indeed, I assure you. Come, 
my good mother, what am I to fear and hope ?' 

'On your own head be it, then; listen: 
you will be married soon; that union will not . 
be happy; you will become a widow, and 
then — then you will be Queen of France! 
three happy years will be yours; but you will i 
shun an hospital amid civil commotion.' 

'On concluding these words," continued 
Josephine, "the old woman burst fron: the 
crowd, and hurried away as fast as her limbs, 
enfeebled by age, would permit. I forbade 
the bystanders to molest or banter the pre- 
tended prophetess on this ridiculous predic- 
tion ; and took occasion, from the seeming 
absurdity of the whole proceeding, to caution 
the young negresses how they gave heed to 
such matters. Henceforth, I thought of the 
affair only to laugh at it with my relatives. 
But afterwards, when my husband had per- 
ished on the scafl\ild, in spite of my better 
judgment, this prediction forcibly recurred to > 
my mind, after a lapse of years; and though i 
I was myself then in prison, the transactioni 
daily assumed a less improbable character, 
and I ended my regarding the fulfilment as 
almost a -matter of course. t 

When fifteen years of age, Josephine went 
to reside with an aimt, who lived at Fontain- 
bleau, in France, and soon afterwards was 
married to the Marquis de Beauharnais. This 
young nobleman, (a descendant of the Beau- 



J Memoirs of Josejihine. — Jo/in S. Mernes. 



JOSEPHINE DE BEAUIIAllN AIS. 



39 



harnais who governed Canada witli sucli 
marked ability,) introduced his bride into the 
dissolute court circles, and her heart was soon 
poisuneei by the tierce pangs of jealousy. At 
lust, remonstrances increased to reproaches, 
and they separated by mutual consent, she 
returning to her native island, where she re- 
sided until a revolt of the negroes drove her 
back to France in a state of destitution. — 
Beauharnais had embraced the principles of 
the revolution, and, in the shocJv of the dang- 
ers of that period, Josephine became recon- 
ciled to him. The beauty of her character 
was, perhaps, never more admirably exhibit- 
ed than in that act of dovotedness at a time 
when others shrank from the responsibility of 
frinidsliip with those who were deeply em- 
barked in the political proceedings of the day. 

The next scene in the eventful drama was 
the arrest of M. de Beauharnais, who had 
been one of tlie noble reformers of abuses, 
one of the advocates of lil)erty , who so eagerly 
hailed the dawn of the revolution in France; 
who had sat in the first meeting of the Tiers 
Etat ; who had voted for the abolition of all 
privileges, and for the equal rights of all citi- 
zens who fought for the republic valiantly, 
who had eiid)raced the people's cause ardent- 
ly, and broke the lies of kindred, and gave 
up the claims of rank readily to serve the 
people; whose heart and soul were devoted 
to liberty, whose constancy and virtue were 
unabated, and who was at last beheaded for 
no other crime than that of noble birth, after 
years of popular service, and after receiving 
bU the honors the republic could bestow. lie 
died on the scaflbld at the age of thirty-four, 
on the 23d of July, in the year 1794. 

Josephine was also arrested and cast into 
prison, where her energetic and confiding con- 
duct, under appalling circumstances, appear 
to have sprung from the double influence of 
lier own mind, and her lingering belief in the 
propiiecy of her future greatness. Her nar- 
rative uf the execution of her husband, and 
[if the momentary anticipation of a similar 
destiny awaiting herself, is full of painful in- 
terest. At length Robespierre fell. — "then 
(wrote Josephine,) my cot-bed was again 
brought into my cell, and I passed the most 
delightful night of my life upon it. I fell 
isleep, after saying to my companions, — 'You 
see 1 am not guillotined — and I shall yei be 
Queen of France! ' " 

Exercising a potent influence with Barras, 
tfadame Josephine de Beauharnais next 
noved in the first circles, and was one of the 
riumvate of beauty who were styled the 
'Three Graces" by the rhymsters of the 
lay — the other two being Mesdames Tallien 
nd Recamier. With the revolution in gov- 
rnment these beautiful women fascinated 
ill Pciris with a revolution in female attire, 
nd appeared in the costumes of ancient 
lome. Tunics a la Diane, (and succint as 
luntress ever wore,) depended siiriply to the 
cnee, and left the arms bare to the very 
houlder, while naked feet were simply tied 
o sandals. Thus attired in a costume which 
eveloped her voluptuous form, and with her 
hick raven hair studded with onyxes, the 



" ox-eyed" brunette was to be seen at all 
the gay resorts, at all the concerts where 
Garat sang, and at every ball where Trcniitz 
danced, (poor Trenitz ! who gave bis name 
to the figure Trenis, and died mad at C'haren- 
ton,) and was the acknowledged queen of 
fashion, at a lime when royalty was abol- 
ished. 

Bonaparte was rarely seen in the gay cir- 
cles of the metropolis, and lived in a retired' 
unostentatious manner at the IL'Acl de la 
Colonnade uilhii rue A'cnve dcs Capucines, 
until an incident occurred which may be con- 
sidered as a prominent epoch in his life. One 
morning, an interesting boy, about twelve 
years of age, presented himself to the Com- 
mander-in-chief, saying " he came to recover 
the sword of his father, who had served as a 
general otHcer in the republican army on the 
Rhine," stating "that he was the son of the 
late Viscomptede Beauharnais, who had fall- 
en under the axe of the guillotine during the 
reign of terror, by order of that fell tyrant 
Robespierre," adding " that he was himself 
christened Eugene : " pleased with the fervid 
manner of the supplicating youth, naturally 
alive to every thing that wore a chivalrous ap- 
pearance, Bonaparte granted the request. — 
When the lad received the relic of his sire, 
he bedewed it with his tears, kissed it with so 
much devotion, pressed it to his breast with 
such itnpassioned earnestness, that he quite 
won the good opinion of the General, exciting 
in his bosom a desire to know more of his 
young supplicant; consequently he treated the 
youthful Eugene with so much kindness, that 
it influenced his mother Josephine to come the 
next day to offer him thanks for the attention 
he had bestowed upon her child. Her un- 
common beauty, added to the singular grace- 
fulness of her address, coupled with her fas- 
cinating polished manners, made so deep an 
impression upon Napoleon, that he began se- 
riously to entertain wishes for a closer union 
with a female who appeared gifted with every 
desirable requisite to insure domestic happi- 
ness. § 

Passing over as unworthy of notice the foul 
calunuiies which Scott, Lockhart, and other 
British writers have circulated in connection 
with Nopoleon's courtship and marriage, we 
copy an interesting letter written by Joseph- 
ine to one who had shared her imprisonment. 

" The advice, I may say, of all my friends, 
urges me, my dear, to marry again ; also the 
commands of my aunt, as well as the prayers 
of my children. Why are you not here to 
help me by your advice on this important oc- 
casion, and to tell me whether I ought or 
ought not to consent to a union, which cer- 
tainly seems calculated to relieve me from 
the discomfort of my present situation ? Your 
friendsiiip would render you clear-sighted to 
my interest, and a word from you, would 
suffice to bring me to a decision. 

" Among my visitors you have seen Gen- 
eral Bonaparte : he is the man who wishes to 
become a father to the orphans of Alexander 
De Beauharnais, and a husband to his widow. 



§, Life of Napoleon. — W. Hodgson, 



40 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 



" Do you love him ? will naturally he your 
first question. My answer is perhaps — No — 
Do you disliUe him ? — No, again ; but the 
sentiments I entertain towards him are of 
that lukewarm kind, which true devotees 
think worst oi" all in matters of religion. — 
Now, love being a sort of religion, my feel- 
ings ought to be very dilFerent to what they 
are. 'i'his is the point on which I want your 
advice, which would fix the wavering of my 
irresolute disposition. To come to a decision 
has always been too much for my creole in- 
ertness, and I find it an easier task to obey 
the wishes of others. 

"1 admire the general's courage; the ex- 
tent of his information on every subject on 
which he converses; his shrewd intelligence, 
which enables him to understand the thoughts 
of others, before they are expressed ; but I 
confess I am somewhat fearful of that control 
which he seems anxious to exercise over all 
about him. There is something in his scru- 
tinizing glance that caimot be described; it 
even awes our directors, therefore it niay 
well be supposed to intimidate a woman. He 
t-ilks of his passion for me with a degree of 
earnestness which renders it impossible to 
doubt his sincerity; yet this very circum- 
stance, which you would suppose likely to 
please me, is precisely that which has hitherto 
withheld me from giving that consent, which 
I have often been on the very point of utler- 

" My spring of life is past. Can I then 
hope to preserve for any length of time, that 
ardor of affection which, in the General, 
amounts almost to madness ? If his love 
should cool, as it certainly will after our mar- 
riage, will he not reproach me for having pre- 
vented him from forming a more advantage- 
ous connection .' What then shall I say .' 
What shall 1 do ? I may shut myself up and 
weep : fine consolation, truly ! methinks I 
hear you say. But unavailing as it is, I as- 
sure you, I know weeping to be my only con- 
solation whenever my poor heart receives a 
wound. Write to me quickly, and pray scold 
me if you think me wrong. You know evary 
thing is welcome that may come from you. 

" Barras assures me if I marry the Gen- 
eral, he will get him appointed commander- 
in-chief of the army of Italy. This favor, 
though not yet granted, occasions some mur- 
murings among Bonaparte's brother officers. 
When speaking to me yesterday on the sub- 
ject, [the General said : ' Do they think I 
cannot get forward without their patronage .' 
One day or other they will all be but too hap- 
py if 1 grant them mine. I have a good 
sword by my side, which will carry me on.' 

"What do you think of this self-confidence.' 
Does it ^not savor of excessive vanity ? a 
general of brigade to talk of patronising the 
chiefs of the government ! It is very ridicu- 
lous ! Yet I know not how it happens, his 
ambitious spirit wins upon me so far, that I 
am almost tempted to believe in the practica- 
bility of any project he may take into his 
head; — and who can foresee what he may 
attempt ? 

"All here regret your absence; and we 



only console ourselves by constantly speaking 
of you, and by endeavoring to follow you step 
by step in the beautiful country in which you 
are journeying. Were I sure to find you in 
Italy, I would consent to be married to-mor- 
row, on condition of being permitted to ac- 
company the General. But we might cross 
each other in the way, therefore I deem it 
more prudent to await your answer : pray 
send it speedily. Madame Tallien desires 
me to present her love to you. She is still 
fair and good as ever. She employs her 
immense interest only for the bentifit of the 
unfortunate; and when she confers a favor, 
she appears as pleased and satisfied as though 
she herself were the party obliged. Her 
friendship for me is most afliectionate and 
sincere, and of my regard for her, I need 
only say, that it is equal to that which I en- 
tertain for yourself. 

" Hortense grows more and more interest- 
ing evei-y day. Her pretty figure is getting 
fully developed, and if I were so inclined, I 
should have ample reason to rail at Time, 
who confers charms on the daughter, at the 
expense of the mother; but truly, I have 
other things in my head. I strive to banish 
gloomy thoughts, and look forward to a more 
propitious future, for v^'e shall soon meet, 
never to part again. But for this marriage, 
which harrasses and unsettles me, I could be 
gay in spite of everything; were it once over, 
happen what might, I could resign myself to 
my fate. I am inured to suffering, and if I 
be destined to taste fresh sorrow, I can sup- 
port it, provided my children, my aunt, and 
you remain to comfort me. 

" You know we have agreed to dispense 
with all formal terminations to our letters. 
So adieu, my friend." 

Bonaparte was married on the 9th of 
March, 1796, by a magistrate, and the Di- 
rectors signed the record as witnesses. The 
bride was about six years older than her hus- 
band, and had two children by her former 
marriage, Eugene, afterwards Viceroy of 
Italy, and Hortense, who became for a time 
Queen of Holland, and was the mother of 
Louis Napoleon. 

The beauty of the bride we have previously 
spoken of, and at the period of her marriage 
her classic features still retained the charm 
and freshness of youth. Luxuriant black 
hair shrouded her noble forehead, and her 
dark eyes melted in the soft languor of tropi- 
cal climes, or flashed with intelligence. She 
spoke with purity — supported her opinions 
with judgment and vivacity — and was alike 
ready in conversation with delicate irony, 
sound logic, or passionate enthusiasm. 

Bonaparte was then slender in person, with 
an erect carriage, and hands and feet of femi- 
nine delicacy. His countenance was manly, 
yet o'ercast with a shade of thought, which 
bespoke the energetic mind, fitted for a high 
destiny. His dark-blue eyes were fiery, his 
nose aquiline, his chin prominent, (like that 
of the Apollo Belvidere,) and he wore his 
dark chestnut hair long, according to the j 
fashion of the time. | 



DEPARTURE 



FOR ITALY 

♦ 



41 



The honeymoon was of brief duration, for 
eight days after the marriage ceremony. Gen- 
eral Bonaparte left his bride to assume the 
command of the " army of Italy." That her 
influence aided in procuring this high office 
for the young soldier, is proved by her letter 
oa the preceding page, but Sir Walter Scott 
never uttered a fouler innuendo than when he 
declared, witli euphonic boldness, that the 
command was " the dowry of tiie Bride" — 
an insinuation that the appointment was given 
to reward Bonaparte for espousing the cast-off" 
mistress of Barras. Achilles did not bribe 
Agamemnon to force Briseis from his tent. 

Rejecting this cruel and unfounded insinu- 
ation as putrescent slander. Major Lee pro- 
nounces this a marked and one of the happi- 
est periods of Napoleon's life. The woman 
of his choice was the wife of his bosom, and 
the field of glory, in which he longed to shine, 
was now expanded to his enterprise. Around 
him were the pleasures of love ; before him 
the prospects of honor: and within him the 
impatience of a martial spirit fretted with the 
reluctance of an enraptured heart. In the 
pauses of hope and joy, if lie looked back on 
the growth of his fortune, from its infancy 
when he was an orphan scholar at Brienne, 
to the vigorous promise of its present state, 
his reflections must have been fraught with 
pure and solid satisfaction. In a season of 
faction, strife, selfishness, suspicion, and cru- 
elty, he had passed from subordination to em- 
inence, without swerving for a moment from 
the path of independence, openness, and hon- 
or: had condescended to no solicitation, stoop- 
ed to no compliance, mixed with no intrigue, 
contracted no obligation, participated in no 
injustice. Persecuted by the deputies, he had 
not sunk into submission; flattered by the 



army, he had not been inflated with self-love: 
so that he escaped the guillotine without pro- 
pitiating the government, and more difljcult 
still, excelled his own commanders without 
disobliging them. His opportunities, which 
were common to officers of his rank, had, in 
every instance, been surpassed by his exploits, 
while his advancement always lagged behind 
his services. Conscious of being indebted to 
no man, he felt that to him Generals owed 
their fame, armies their success, individuals 
their lives, and the government its existence. 
Such may well have been his reflections at 
this dawning season of his fame; for nothing 
is more remarkable in his history, than the 
direct, and undesigning steps by which his 
elevation was accomplished. Filled with 
such thoughts as these, and "snuffing the bat- 
tle from afar," upon the difficulty of succeed- 
ing where older Generals had failed 
being suggested to him, he said, "in one cam- 
paign I shall be old or dead;" meaning that 
he would have gained innnortality or lost his 
life.* 

Before leaving for the frontier. General 
Bonaparte sat to David for his portrait. 
When about to return from his victorious 
campaign, a gentleman who wished to obtain 
a favor from Madame Bonaparte, ordered a 
fm, covered with allegorical and emblemati- 
cal designs, with a portrait of her husband in 
the centre. Chaudet, a celebrated draughts- 
man, furnished the design — and the portrait, 
engraved by J. Godefroy, is the frontispiece 
of this vvork.t 



* Life of Napoleon. — Lee. 

t It has been printed from the original plate, by 
Mr. Geor-je (i. Smith, of Boston. 



Autography of Napoleon Bonaparte. 



Facsimile of his signature when General- 




Facsimile of his signature v)hen Einpernr- 




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